I LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



# . 

I UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. |: 



REMINISCENCES AND INIMbKCST. 



IN THE 



LIFE AND TRAVELS 



OF A 



PIONEER PREACHER 



OF THE **j^N"CIE:NT»' OOSFEL; 



WITH A FEW CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 



By NATHAN J. MITCHELL. 



TO WHICH ARE APPENDED A SHORT BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE LATE JOHN P. 
MITCHELL, AND SOME OP HIS DISCOURSES ON GOSPEL THEMES, 



^JM.M 



CINCINNATI: 
CHASE & HALL, PUBLISHERS, 

NOf 180 Elm Street. 

'''^ 1877. 




3X7 343 



Copyrighted, 1877, by Nathan J. Mitchell. 



/^'3^fy$' 



PREFACE. 



Every book should have a prefe-ce. We are not willing that 
the following pages be given to those who may think proper to 
peruse them without staling their design. Whoever reads the 
work will discover that it is without its fellow in all the repub- 
lic of letters. He can not fail to discover that the author was 
really in earnest ; that the clouds and dark shadows that had hung 
over his youthful pathway, having been brushed away and dis- 
sipated by the clear light of the "ancient gospel," he basked in 
the beautiful sunshine of God's word as found upon the sacred 
pages of the apostles and evangelists of Jesus the Christ. 

It must be evident to every thinking person that, up to the 
beginning of the present century, in several essential particulars, 
Protestantism had failed to restore to the people primitive Chris- 
tianity. While stoutly affirming that the '' Bible is the religion 
of Protestants," they nevertheless taught and practiced some 
things which have no warrant of Holy Scripture to support 
them. Infant baptism was strenuously insisted on, which has 
no higher authority than the Roman Catholic Church in its 
favor. Sprinkling was substituted for immersion. This might 
seem to some a matter of indifference. Upon further considera- 
tion, however, it will be found far otherwise. In the wisdom of 
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, baptism in water meets the peni- 
tent believer at the very threshold of his admission into the 
kingdom of Christ, which was set up on the day of Pentecost. 
(See Acts ii.) Sprinkled infants in the name of the Trinity grew 

(V) 



VI PREFACE. 

up all over the land, manifesting a subordination of tlie moral 
to the animal man. When convinced of sin, and the necessity 
of salvation from the galling yoke of sin, their teachers were 
unprepared to direct them on account of the institution of bap- 
tism having been taken away. The mourner's-bench, the anx- 
ious-seat, the altar of prayer, had usurped the place of God's 
command. 

Then written human creeds had become numerous, dividing 
and subdividing into greater and less -communities those who 
loved the Lord. Thus creeds and consequent sectarianism be- 
came a reproach and a crying evil. 

Many good men in various parts of Christendom saw and greatly 
deplored these things. A simultaneous restlessness seized the 
minds of many in different parts of the United States This 
unrest on the part of good and noble men and women was su- 
perinduced by the unsatisfactory nature in the essential features 
of Protestantism. The Protestant had no confessional to which 
he could resort and unburthen his guilty conscience to a priest 
who stood between him and his God. If he went direct to God 
through the great High Priest, Jesus the Son of God, the evi- 
dence of his acceptance of God came not in words or signs that 
were satisfactory. Doubts, fears, unrest, and religious gloom 
characterized those who were moving on under the various sys- 
tems of Protestantism. 

About the beginning of the present century, Elias Smith be- 
gan, as he thought, to see his way out of the dark wilderness. 
Being anxious to enlighten others, he commenced and continued 
for some time to publish, in New England, a periodical entitled 
the Gospel Luminary. I saw and read a few numbers of it. It 
did not amount to more than a small rush-light among the dark 
bogs and morasses. 



PREFACE, Vll 

Barton W. Stone, of Kentucky, wlio became thorougUy dis- 
gusted with the spirit of sectarianism, at the close of the "great 
revival in Kentucky" laid aside the clerical robes of Presbyte- 
rianism, and doned the habilaments of an humble Christian, 
nothing more, and resolved to be, by the favor of God, nothing 
less. 

In the year 1823, Alexander Campbell, of Buffalo, Va., com- 
menced the publication of a periodical, entitled the Christian 
Baptist. This work was aggressive and offensive. Creeds or 
confessions of faith, merely human, were exposed to the clear 
light of day, as bones of contention and barriers to the union 
and communion of the people of God. The kingdom of the clergy 
came in for a well-merited share of opposition, on account of 
their tyranny and usurpation over the faith and conscience of 
the people. Many read, studied, and digested the caustic and 
pointed essays of the erudite editor of the Christian Baptist. 
The ''ancient gospel," in bold contrast with those of modern or- 
igin, began to be exhumed from the accumulated rubbish of 
ages. The debris was cleared away, and there lay prostrate the 
glorious gospel of the blessed God. It was not, however, till the 
year 1827, that men began to run to and fro to re-proclaim the 
ancient gospel, and appeal to the people to accept it by believ- 
ing and obeying it — to exhibit and illustrate its God-given prin- 
ciples, in faith and obedience, in letter and in spirit. 

In August of that year, I was brought under the influence 
of the saving power of the gospel of Christ, as announced by 
the inspired apostles of Christ. It was so unlike what I had 
heard as gospel, that I thought it would be but a short time till 
all would hear, believe, and obey. I could not be accepted by 
any pedobaptist denomination. I could not be fellowshiped by 
any Baptist denomination. They all had human creeds, and 



VlU PREFACE. 

did not preach the ancient gospel, only in part. Therefore, I 
started into the wide world to re-proclaim the story of the cross, 
and exhort men to save themselves fi-om this untoward genera- 
tion. 

The following pages delineates the sadness superinduced by 
erroneous religious teaching, — the joy arising from a discovery 
of God's plan of saving sinners in time and in eternity, and 
what one encountered when unsupported by the prestige of an 
orthodox ecdesiasticism, — cut loose from sects and sectarianism, 
with the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, to wage 
war against sin in every form. i 

NATHAN J. MITCHELL. 

Howard, Centre Co., Pa., April 23, 1877. 



COIsrTEK"TS 



CHAPTEE I. 

Who were my ancestors — Their nationality and religious views — The 
birth of my sister and two brothers — My own birth — Time and 
place — Time of moving to Ohio — Our settling in the woods — Facili- 
ties for book-learning — Going to an animal show — To " camp-meet- 
ing." 13-29 

CHAPTEK II. 

Preaching of the "Newlights," Bailey and Pancoast — Kentucky preach- 
ers of the B. W. Stone School — Personal Description of Elder 
John Secrest — His success in proselyting in Eastern Ohio — His 
interviews with Alexander Campbell — By him he was taught 
the design of Baptism — " Camp-meeting " — A Bishop there — Doubts 
and gloomy fears from false theology, etc 30-46 

CHAPTER III. 

Staxted to attend the debate between Campbell and Owen — Preached at 

Wolf Creek — Sunday Creek — Thence we went to Butland, Meiga 

(ix) 



CONTENTS. 

County, Ohio — Attended a Union meeting of Immersionists — Great 
excitement — Conflict between the ancient and modern gospels — 
Triumph of the former — ^Moved on westwardly — Stopped at Antioch 
meeting-house — ^At Shakertown — And arrived safe at Cincinnati in 
time for the debate 47-85 



CHAPTER IV. 

Tour through the North-west in company with John Secrest — An en- 
counter with Mormon Elders, etc. — Eeturn to Ohio — Meeting at 
■ New Lisbon — Thomas and Alexander Campbell and Walter Scott 
there 86-114 



CHAPTER V. 

Description of the Bald Eagle Valley and surrounding country — Wil- 
liamsport — Scene in a meeting-house — Lapel of a brother's coat torn 
off — Mennonites and disciples build a meeting-house — Know nothing 
of dedicating a house to the Lord — Visit to Bradford County — First 
acquaintance with Dr. S. E. Shepard 115-130 



CHAPTER VI. 

An account of a New Testament — Second visit to Bradford County — Met 
E. S. Hubble— Went out to the State of New York— Met J. J. Moss 
for the first time — Anti-preaching brethren treated us coldly — Learned 
better afterwards— D. G. Mitchell made me a visit 131-143 



CONTENTS. XI 

CHAPTER VII. 

Tour to Ohio via Ebensburg, Pittsburgh, Minerva — Visit my parents — 
Went from Meigs County to Dayton — Back to Jamestown — Bro. M. 
Winans relating his conversion — Preaching of Bro. Raines, and Wi- 
nans' baptism — Debate with Mr. McClain — Novel close of the de- 
bate 144-157 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Return from Ohio to Centre Co., Pa. — Removed to Beech Creek — The 
system of common-schools inaugurated — Labored in the cause of the 
schools for a number of years — Death of my mother-in-law — Re- 
moved to the old homestead where my wife was born and reared — 
Took a clerkship at Harrisburg — Acquaintance with some of the 
members of the Church of God — Remained over a year, and returned 
to my field of labor in Bald Eagle Valley 158-183 

SERMONS. 

The Faith once Delivered to the Saints 184-196 

The New Birth 197-213 

The Grace of God 214-228 

Sermon on the Words of Peter... 229-238 

The Seven Units 239-263 

JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

Biographical Sketch 264-265 

Address 266-274 



xu CONTENTS. 

The Keys of the Kingdom 275-289 

The Good Fight of Faith 290-303 

Things Temporal and Things Eternal 304-315 

Blinded by the God of this World 316-330 

Address 331-336 

The Weakness of God is Stronger than Man 337-352 

Sermon Preached at Beaver Creek, Ind 353-363 

The Old Way 364-375 

The Obedient have the Promise of Eternal Salvation 376-389 

The Straight Gate and Narrow Way 390-401 

All Things Work together for Good 402-408 

Things Temporal and Things Eternal 409-422 

Man a Compound Being: connected to the Natural and Spirit- 
ual World 423-435 

The Death of Christ 436-455 

Jesus the Way, the Truth, and the Life 456-465 

Our Hope in Death 466-479 



REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 



LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 



CHAPTEE I. 



Who were my ancestors — Their nationality and religious views — The 
birth of my sister and two brothers — My own birth — Time and 
place — Time of moving to Ohio — Our settling in the woods — Facili- 
ties for book-learning — Going to an animal show — To '' camp-meet- 
ing." 

I WAS born March 2, 1808, in Pikerun Township, 
Washington County, Pennsylvania. William Mitchell, 
my father, and James Mitchell, my grandfather, were 
both born in Cumberland County, in the same State. 
They were of Scotch-Irish blood, and religiously of the 
school of John Knox. My maternal grandfather, Nathan 
Johns, was a AVelshman, and his wife, Elizabeth Dellum, 
was a native of England. 

My grandfather Mitchell married Hetty Gibson, who 
was also of the Scotch-Irish blood, and tenacious of the 
"doctrines of grace,^' as stated and elaborated by John 
Calvin and John Knox. On that side of the house, there- 
fore, my ancestors were Calvinistic in their religious views 
from time immemorial. On my mother's side, my ances- 
tors were religiously members of the Quaker Society, 
grandmother Johns being a preacher, or "public friend," 

(13) 



14 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

often moved, as she no doubt honestly supposed, by the 
Spirit, to speak in public meetings, and to travel from 
place to place "to bear testimony" to the truth, as she 
understood it. My mother, Ann Johns, had a birthright 
membership in the Society of Friends, but forfeited it 
in marrying my father, and afterwards refusing to express 
sorrow for so doing. 

My father and mother were married in the spring of 
1803. My eldest sister, the first-born of my father^s fam- 
ily, was born in March, 1804 ; the second, James Gibson, 
in December, 1805; I, in 1808, as before stated; and 
David G., in September, 1811. In the month of April, 
1813, my father and mother, with their young family, 
moved from Pennsylvania to Kirkwood Township, Bel- 
mont County, Ohio. At that time, this part of Ohio was 
but sparsely settled, especially the western portion of this 
county. Father settled in the woods, two miles and a 
half from the Guernsey County line, and the same dis- 
tance from a little village called Fairview. The quarter 
section of land which he purchased and settled upon was 
a dense forest. Native forest trees of the largest kind, 
consisting of w^hite oak, sugar, hickory, red and black 
oak, chestnut, w^alnut, etc., stood thickly on every acre of 
the one hundred and sixty. The underbrush was literally 
a "deep tangled wildwood" of spice- wood and hazel 
bushes, grape vines, etc. 

Sometime in the month of May, 1813, our family took 
up their abode in a rude log-cabin, made in the primitive 
backwood's style, of rough, unhewn logs ; the crevices filled 
with small blocks of wood, daubed with a mixture of 
clay and cut straw; the roof composed of clapboards, 
and the floor of "puncheons." This had been built, and 
a small space cleared out by my father, while the family 
staid at the house of Philip Hawkins, in the neighbor- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 15 

hood. The space cleared was large enough to let in the 
light of the sun, and all the rest of the prospective farm 
was an unbroken wilderness. A beautiful, limpid spring 
of ever-flowing water rose near the cabin, the rivulet from 
which found its way into Stillwater Creek, which is a 
tributary of the Muskingum River. Here my father, with 
unflinching energy, compact muscle and indomitable res- 
olution, began the work of winning from mother earth, 
sustenance for himself and growing family. A number 
of families were similarly situated in the circumjacent 
region, some having been settled a longer and some a 
shorter time. 

The Methodists were the religious pioneers of this new 
country, and labored with commendable zeal in warning 
sinners to " flee from the wrath to come '^ and urging 
them to ^'get religion.^' "When I was about six years old, 
there was a Methodist preacher on the Barnesville circuit, 
named James Findlay, and our little neighborhood, being 
but seven miles from Barnesville, was included in the 
" circuit.^^ Father and mother, having united themselves 
with the Methodists, took their four children to meeting 
when the preacher in charge was present, and, as they 
honestly supposed, had us dedicated to the Lord in the 
sacred rite of baptism, by the "office and ministry" of 
Mr. Findlay. Kather an amusing incident occurred on 
this occasion. David, then the babe, had learned to say 
a few things, one of which was the word enough, which 
he would shout vociferously when any thing occurred not 
agreeable to him. Just as the gentleman was repeating 
the formula, and scattering a few drops of water upon 
the child's face, he cried out at the top of his voice 
"enough! enough! enough!" to the great discomfiture 
of the preacher and the devout members, and the amuse- 
ment of the less serious of the congregation. Many 



] 6 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

times, in his more mature years, has that same voice been 
raised to proclaim the truth, that a few drops of water are 
not enough to constitute the one baptism of which the 
great Apostle wrote to the Church at Ephesus, and too 
much for the sinless brow of those of whom the Son of 
God said, "Of such is the kingdom of heaven." 

As soon as we were at all able, we children were put 
to work to assist in clearing up the land. When very- 
young, we could gather brush into heaps, ready for burn- 
ing, at the proper season of the year, when it became 
dry, and at this, and similar employments, w^e were kept 
constantly busy from the time we were able to assist 
never so little. As respected means of education, of 
course they were very limited. Kude log-cabins were 
erected here and there through the neighborhood, and 
called school-houses. Nearly one entire end of these 
buildings was taken up for chimney and fire-place. 
Greased paper, pasted across openings on each side 
where logs had been removed, served to admit light into 
the room. Immediately under these windows, auger 
holes were bored into the logs, into which pins were 
driven to support the writing desks; backless benches, 
formed by boring four holes into a "puncheon" board, 
and inserting pins for feet, were the only seats. These 
were usually so high that the feet of children could 
not reach the floor by several inches, and from morning 
to night they dangled between the bench and the floor, 
except when put to use in walking to the teacher's desk 
to recite a lesson, which eflbrt was very frequently re- 
warded by a box on the ear, because the lesson was not 
well learned. A school-master who could read and write, 
and cipher as far as the " double rule of three," was re- 
garded as well qualified to teach. I remember when, on 
a certain occasion, a strange teacher came into the neigh- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 17 

borhood, who was regarded as a prodigy of learning, for 
he had advanced in arithmetic as far as "scu broot^' 
(cube root). The signs of addition, subtraction, etc., 
were treated with silent contempt, and the impression 
grew with us all that they were inserted by blundering 
printers, who knew nothing of science. The words, quo- 
tient, remainder, sum, etc., had no meaning to us, and 
W'C often wondered that results in mathematical calcula- 
tions should be called any thing else but what we called 
them — answers. I remember that a boy, older than 
either of us by several years, gave brother James and 
me our first impressions in regard to English grammar. 
He was a member of one of the aristocratic families of 
the neighborhood, and had been sent away to attend a 
better school than ours. He said he had been required 
to study a thing called grammar ; that with great labor 
he had got as far as the eighteenth rule of syntax, and 
was then compelled to give it up. He gave it as his 
opinion that very few boys were smart enough to study 
grammar, and he had evidently abandoned the effort in 
disgust and despair. 

My father was very strict and rigid with his children, 
and I used to think, and still think, that he put a con- 
struction too literal upon what the wise man says in 
regard to the use of the rod. I know it had the effect 
upon me of often causing me to make false statements to 
escape punishment, with a rod. There occurred a re- 
markable incident in my life, illustrative of this, which 
I will relate. 

In May, 1815, I was in a corn-field with my father 
and brother James. The former was engaged in what 
we called "plowing the middles out." In those times, 
in that country, ground was prepared for planting corn 
by throwing two furrows together with a plow, forming 
2 



18 BEmmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

a ridge ; tlien, at proper distances for rows of corn, simi- 
lar ridges were formed in the same way, until a whole 
field was ridged. These ridges were then crossed at 
right angles with a plow, until the field was thus laid 
off in squares all over. Corn was planted at the angles, 
and this would, of course, leave a space which was not 
plowed in the middle of every square. When the corn 
had grown up a little, these middles were plowed out, and 
in doing this, the plow Avould sometimes throw clods 
upon the hills of corn. James and I had for our task 
the removal of these clods. We found that we could do 
this and have some time to play, and we commenced 
hunting for bird's-nests, each being anxious to find the 
first nest. I remember there was an elm stump about 
fifteen feet high, having no bark on it, and perfectly 
white, near where we were. I saw a hole in it not far 
from the ground, into which I thrust my hand. I with- 
drew it suddenly, for something bit me severely in the 
forefinger of the right hand. I peeped cautiously into 
the hole, and caught a glimpse of what I supposed to be 
a ground-squirrel; but I felt satisfied with the hunting 
of bird^s-nests, and returned to my work. The wound 
in my finger became excessively painful, and felt as 
though a burning coal of fire was lying on it. I could 
not refrain from shaking and blowing the wounded mem- 
ber; and my motions attracted father's attention as he 
passed by me in following the plow. He stopped in 
his work, and asked what ailed me. I feared to tell him 
that I had left my work to hunt bird's-nests, and been 
bitten by a squirrel, and I told him that I had been 
handling a corn-stalk of the previous year's growth, and 
got a sliver into my finger. "Well," said he, "that will 
teach you to be more careful hereafter," and he went on 
with liis work. He had often warned us not to put our 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHEE. 19 

hands about old stumps and logs, and punishment was 
always sure to follow any disobedience on our part, and 
to escape, on this occasion, I resorted to falsehood. In 
a little while, I became so sick and dizzy that I found 
I must lie down or I would fall. I crossed to the other 
end of the field, and stretched myself upon the trunk of 
a fallen tree. As soon as father came to that part of the 
field, he noticed me, left the plow, and came to examine 
my wound. No sooner had his eyes rested upon it, than 
he looked horrified, and pronounced it at once a snake 
bite. James then reported that he had seen me put my 
hand in a hollow stump. They both ran to the stump, 
and there discovered a huge snake of the copper-head 
species, which made its presence known by springing 
from its coiled position in the stump at father's face, 
when he cautiously looked into the hole where I had 
thrust my hand. It was soon dispatched, and with all 
haste I was taken up in father's arms and hurried to the 
house. For weeks and months I was confined to bed, 
and to the house, from the efiects of the bite of this 
venomous beast, and my adventure after bird's-nests 
came near costing me my life. 

"Whether it was or was not a snake which " beguiled " 
Eve, I am not able to say ; but I am quite certain that 
there is enmity between one of her sons and all the ser- 
pent kind. I have always felt a bitter antipathy to 
snakes. I have never felt disposed to caress them, or put 
them into cages, and I never wanted to see them when 
they had been caged and were on exhibition. Even the 
boa-constrictor had no attractions for me; and I confess 
that I hate the whole genus with a perfect hatred, and ad- 
vise all to have nothing to do with them, except to destroy 
all that can be reached as quickly as possible. 

When I was about ten years old I commenced going to 



20 REmmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

a school, which I attended for about fifteen months with- 
out missing many days. When I commenced to go to 
this school, I could spell words of one syllable. One 
Sunday, I well remember, that father gave me a task to 
commit while he and mother were absent at meeting. It 
was to commit a short column of words which were arbi- 
trarily arranged in a spelling-book, entitled, " TAe United 
States Spelling- Booh. Printed by Echbaum & Creamer, 
Pittsburghy PaJ' I shall never forget the intense delight 
with which I spelled over the column of words from 
memory to my parents on their return. The words are 
indelibly impressed upon my memory, just as I recited 
them then : D-a-b, dab ; s-a-d, sad ; n-a-g, nag ; c-a-n, can ; 
1-a-p, lap; j-a-r, jar; f-a-t, fat; w-a-x, wax. These are 
the first words I ever committed to memory from any 
book. When I was through the fifteen months' school 
above mentioned, I could read in the New Testament 
class, which was a proud attainment for one of my age at 
that time. 

While I was yet a child, I had the promise, with the 
other children of the family older than I, that we should 
be taken by father to the town of Fairview, to see an 
animal show, which was advertised to be there in a few 
days. The elephant "Betty,'' two lions, a panther, a 
leopard, etc., were to be exhibited. Ail who are now 
men know that the boy who has such a promise is greatly 
excited, and longs for the arrival of the day to which, 
with joyful anticipations, he looks forward. Time dragged 
slowly along, the day came, and we went to the " show." 
I saw all that was to be seen, but to my young mind 
Betty was better worth seeing than all the other animals 
together. Her wonderfal tusks, far-reaching trunk, enor- 
mous ears, and ponderous body, filled me with wonder 
and astonishment. It constantly occurred to me that there 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 21 

were genuine animals, the veritable originals of which I 
had often seen pictures in books. The impressions then 
made on my mind as to the appearance and character of 
the animals I saw were correct impressions, and they have 
never changed. But some time after this event, there was 
another which produced impressions upon my mind 
equally profound, but not equally true. 

When I was quite a youth, it was announced that there 
would be a camp-meeting in a grove near Barnesville, and 
we had the promise that we should attend this, as it was 
formerly promised that we should go to the animal show. 
Our excitement was as great on this occasion as it had 
been on the other. And to add to the usual interest of 
the camp-meeting, there was a wonder to be seen at this 
one which every body did not have the satisfaction of wit- 
nessing even at camp-meeting. Bishop Enoch George was 
to be there/ Bishop with me, at that time, was a big word, 
and was the great title of a great man. A bishop ! 
thought I ; he lives a great way off, commands and con- 
trols the Methodist forces, and in the exercise of his 
authority ^' Says to this man, Come, and he cometh ; and 
to this man. Go, and he goeth.^' To anticipate the ani- 
mal show was exciting. To look forward to the camp- 
meeting was no less exciting ; and if the elephant carried 
away the palm in the one case, so did the bishop in the 
other. 

The time at last arrived. The people had made great 
preparations, and now they packed up the things necessary 
for use at the camp, and betook themselves to the selected 
locality. Many young people had resolved to '^get relig- 
ion" at the meeting. Many old members wanted to get 
more religion, and "backsliders'^ expected to be *' re- 
newed. '^ Camp-meeting was a heavy word, and with it 
was associated the idea that greater and better facilities 



22 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

were to be found^ while it progressed, for "getting relig- 
ion " than at any other time. 

All the days of a camp-meeting are " big '^ days to those 
who participate, but there is usually one greater than all. 
On this day I went to the meeting to see and hear, but, above 
all, to see the bishop. From every point of the compass 
the people came — in wagons, on horseback, and whole 
battalions of pedestrians. There were on the ground 
wooden tents, linen tents, and, above all, the preacher^s 
tent. Bishop George was there, and I, a mere lad, saw 
and heard him. At that time I thought he looked and 
talked very much like a man, and, so far as appearance 
was concerned, he did not so well answer my anticipa- 
tions as the elephant of the former show. But there was 
uo getting away from the fact that he was a bishop; that 
under his supervision and jurisdiction were many great 
men — Presiding Elders, preaching men, who rode circuits 
on fine horses, besides local preachers, who could marry 
people, class-leaders, licensed exhorters and stewards. All 
these were under the command of the bishop. Though 
I was not greatly impressed with his appearance, he being 
so much like any other preacher, I was most profoundly 
impressed with the idea of his greatness, all of which it 
seemed to me was of God. My parents being devout 
Methodists, and paying great regard to the Methodist 
preachers, I was led to look upon them with reverence 
and veneration. What they said and taught I regarded 
as oracular, and felt that it would be presumptuous irrev- 
erence to doubt or dispute their teaching. No wonder, 
then, that with awe and reverence I reflected that I was 
in the presence of the great preacher of all the. preachers. 

The recollection of facts and scenes which were pre- 
sented to my view in childhood and youth greatly en- 
hance my appreciation of primitive, apostolic Christianity. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 23 

The investigations and severe criticism of established 
forms of religion, and careful comparison of them with 
the teaching of the apostles, have, within the last forty 
years, greatly changed the current of religious thought, 
and brought to light much truth which had been lost or 
forgotten. In many localities now young people who are 
desirous of serving God, know very well lioio to become, 
and how to continue. Christians. They have no misgivings 
as to what God requires of them, nor any trouble of mind 
as to what church they should " join.^^ They have learned 
from infancy that there is but one ^^ House of God, which 
is the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground 
of truth.'' They can scarcely appreciate their own blessed 
privileges, or understand the fearful situation of those 
who, in my young days, felt most deeply their need of 
Christ, and knew not how to find him. 

To me, at the time I speak of, the host of preachers 
seemed the "called and sent" messengers of God to teach 
the only way of salvation, and a terribly hard way it 
seemed to me, when I afterward sought to walk in it. All 
that occurred at the camp-meeting seemed right to me 
then, but oh, how unlike primitive Christianity it was ! 
To " get religion '' was to be accepted of God, and all 
efforts were concentrated upon the one object of getting 
religion. The modus operandi for the accomplishment of 
the end in view was exciting, wonderfully exciting. 
Preachers, with stentorian voices, would depict the writh- 
ings and contortions of the damned in the flames of an 
ever-burning and inextinguishable, literal hell, the 
devil and his imps, with red-hot pitchforks, tossing into 
the interior of the horrible pit those who had reached 
the walls, and were endeavoring to escape. The marvel- 
ous power of the Holy Ghost to come down, convict and 
convert the sinner, and save him from the tortures of this 



24 EEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

fearful hell, would be declaimed with great vehemence, 
until terriJ&ed sinners came to look upon the Spirit as the 
real Saviour, and lost sight of the Lamb of God who 
takcth away sin. Under such preaching, the more timid 
and impressible would become greatly excited, and by 
cries and tears and wailings, manifest their terror. Then 
an invitation for mourners to come to the altar of prayer 
would be followed by a rush of youths and maidens, sires 
and matrons into the place set apart as an "altar of 
prayer," w^hile hundreds of voices would thunder forth 
the hymn, " Come, ye sinners, poor and needy," to the 
tune of Howard. The singing over, and the altar well 
filled up, the praying would commence in good and most 
sincere earnest. The great object of the prayers appeared 
to be to induce God to be reconciled to the mourners, so 
that he would send the Holy Ghost down to take pos- 
session of their hearts, and powerfully and soundly con- 
vert them. The following and similar sentences would 
occur often in the prayers: "O Lord, come down just now 
among us ! " " Kill and make alive ! " " Baptize the 
people with the Holy Ghost and with fire!" "Send 
down fire from on high and burn up all the dross of base 
desire ! " The surroundings for making Christians were 
favorable. The preachers were generally hale and pow- 
erful physically, and by no means under par intellectually 
and morally. Their zeal was worthy of a better cause, 
and their desire to do good commendable. 

What fault, then, may we find with such scenes as this 
I witnessed in my youth, and have witnessed many times 
since? These people were ignorant of God's plan of 
saving sinners ; they had not learned from the word of 
God the functions of a Christian bishop (an overseer in a 
single congregation of Christ's disciples) ; they were not 
aware that it was improper to pray to God to be recon- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER FBEACHER. 25 

ciled to tlie sinner; they committed gross error when 
they preached, and prayed, and sang, that Christ died to 
reconcile the Father, and sought to increase the efficacy 
of the atoning blood of the Son of God by adding to it 
their own agony and prayers. How consolatory to know 
the truth — the simple, grand, beautiful truth — Christ died 
to reconcile the world to God : '^ We pray you in Christ^s 
stead, be ye reconciled to God'^ (2 Cor. v. 20). "And with 
many other words did he exhort and testify, saying, Save 
yourselves from this untow^ard generation '' (Acts ii. 40). I 
am glad that the ancient gospel delivered me from the 
gloomy doubts and anxious fears of the gospel of Christ 
perverted, "w^hich is indeed not another gospel.^^ But 
long years of gloom, and fear, and fruitless effort went by, 
darkening my otherwise joyous youth with a shadow 
worse than death before I found the light. 

When I became old enough to think I ought to do 
something to save my soul, I w^as fully and completely 
indoctrinated in the Methodist idea of getting religion. 
This was a matter of course from my surroundings and 
religious teaching. One day, when reaping wheat with a 
sickle, I nearly severed my little finger from the hand. 
It healed up rapidly on the surface, but was not healed 
from the bone. This caused ^n affection of the glands, 
producing swelling and inflammation on the inside of the 
elbow and in the arm-pit, which became very painful, and 
finally suppurated and discharged. An alarming running 
sore was formed in the arm-pit, which continued for more 
than a year. I was told that it was dangerous, and might 
cause my death. This greatly alarmed and troubled me. 
I desired to have the fear of death, under which I pined 
continually, taken away. If all the riches of Golconda 
had been mine, I would have given all, and gladly have 
taken the rags and misery of beggary, if I could but 
3 



26 BFMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

have "enjoyed religion/^ as the phrase was. But this I 
could not enjoy until I first got it, and how to get it I 
knew not. I would most fervently pray in secret, by day 
and by night, seeking, as I never sought for any thing 
before, to obtain " the blessing/' The heavens were brass 
over my head, and for me there seemed to be no mercy. 
God was not willing in my case to be reconciled. Gloomy 
feelings, mental anguish, and wretched melancholy became 
with me chronic. I was so much afraid of death, that I 
often wondered in the mornings that I was still alive. I 
was dreadfully afraid of the hell depicted by the preach- 
ers. I remember that a distinguished Methodist preacher, 
named Waterman, on a certain occasion was stopping at 
our house. Father had heard him repeat some poetry in 
a sermon sometime before, and now requested him to 
write it down. Having made a beautiful quill pen with a 
long, sharp nib, saying in reply to father's remark that it 
was a beautiful pen, "Yes, I know how to make a pen. 
I have made thousands. I am an old school-teacher," he 
proceeded to write off the poetry in what father called 
"a splendid running hand." It was the first time I had 
ever heard of a running hand. We committed the poetry, 
and I give it here from memory as I learned it then ; 

" And must I dwell in torment and despair, 
As many years as atoms in the air ? 
When these are gone, as many to ensue 
As stems of grass on hills and vales that grow ; 
When these are gone, as many on their march 
As starry lamps that gild yon spangled arch ; 
When these are gone, as many millions more 
As grains of sand that crowd the ebbing shore; 
When these are gone, as many millions more 
As moments in the millions passed before ; 
When all those doleful years are spent in pain, 
And multiplied by myriads again 

Till numbers drown the thought ; 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 27 

Could I but then suppose 

My wretched years were at a close, 
It would afford some ease. 
But, ah ! I quake to think upon the burning main, 
Gnawing my chains, I wish for death in vain. 
Oh, that this damning God, who cursed me into birth, 
Would bless me back to nothing with a dash." 

The sentiment contained in this poetry exactly ac- 
corded with the preaching which characterized the decla- 
mations of the Methodist preachers of those days. It 
made the blood cold^ and the hair to stand erect, of 
those who were of nervous temperaments, and many who 
heard it cried out, Lord, save ; or I perish ! In me it 
produced a sullen, melancholy gloom. The idea that 
the blessed Redeemer had died to reconcile the Father, 
and still, neither his death, nor the prayers and cries and 
tears of lost men would move the " First Person of the 
Trinity" to be reconciled to a poor sinner, wrought 
within my young bosom, I must confess, most unworthy 
notions of the great, merciful, and glorious Father of 
the Lord Jesus Christ. This was, however, Methodist 
theology, not the "glorious gospel of the grace of God.'' 

By degrees, and in the lapse of some years, I became 
more calm, and better reconciled to my condition and 
the inevitable course of Providence. I read Young's 
"Night Thoughts," Pope's "Essay on Man," Hervey's 
"Meditations," — "Among the Tombs" and "On the 
Starry Heavens" — Fletcher's "Checks to Antinomian- 
ism," and some of the works of John Wesley. I also 
taxed myself to read the Scriptures through, in the order 
in which the books are arranged in the common version, 
and this I did over and over again. I did all this read- 
ing at times of recreation from the severe toil of chopping 
and grubbing, which we were all engaged in, for the re- 
demption of the land from a tremendous growth of 



28 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

timber and copse, which were found all over Belmont 
County when in its native state. 

When I was about sixteen years old, there occurred a 
most melancholy event in my history. A boy some tAVO 
years older than I — a boon companion in sports and 
plays and innocent amusements — took sick and died. 
As he had never ^'got religion," nor ever tried, I felt 
assured, from my religious ideas at that time, that my 
lively and congenial companion had certainly gone to 
that very hell w4iich I had so often heard depicted by 
the Methodist preachers and teachers. This death oc- 
curred in the month of August, which we always re- 
garded as the sickly season; and from that day to this, 
the song of the beetle and the katydid, which usually 
begin that time of the year, recall to me the sadness 
and gloom which filled me then, and to me the poem 
beginning " The melancholy days have come," has 
always been true. These impressions were made on ac- 
count of the religious circumstances by w^hich I w^as sur- 
rounded, and the vague, uncertain, and unsatisfying 
nature of the teaching I received. Faith, which had no 
object, was declared to be essential to salvation, and with- 
out it an accountable being was said to be inevitably 
doomed to suffer the torments of an ever-burning hell. 
This faith was said to be a direct gift from God, and 
generally came in answer to fervent prayer. What it 
was, and how it might be identified, were mysteries 
known only to the initiated. JRepentance was insisted on, 
also, as absolutely necessary that one might be saved; 
and the salvation itself was represented to be an assur- 
ance that one had "got religion," and was in a fair way 
to escape the vengeance of an angry God. 

The result, upon me, of all I heard on this subject, 
and of all I read, was to lead me to conclude that 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 29 

^^evangelical repentance^' consisted of a certain amount of 
Borrow for sin. "Whenever a sufficiency of sorrow had 
been experienced, the light would break in upon the 
mourner as a flood, and the dark and gloomy soul be 
filled by unspeakable joy. I regarded repentance and 
penance as synonyms, though the penitent was not to 
afflict his flesh by ingenious torture, but to torment his 
§oul in agonies much more terrible than any physical 
pain. Anguish of mind, deep, gloomy, horrible sorrow 
for sin, which, when it had become an agony supernat- 
ural and unendurable, would be received as a sufficient 
atonement, on the sinner's part, for all his sins. Re- 
pentance, to me, seemed a sort of savior, and I strove 
with all my might to feel badly. I prayed that I might 
be more radically and thoroughly convicted of sin. I 
longed to feel as though I would willingly be damned, 
so that thereby I might be saved. Among other things, 
I had read, in some Methodist book, a dissertation on 
the difference between conviction and conversion, and the 
danger to a sinner of confounding them in his mind. 
But with all my reading, meditation, and prayer, I had 
no true idea of what either conviction or conversion was. 
The miserable system of theology under which I was 
brought up, misrepresented God, misrepresented Christ, 
misrepresented the Holy Spirit, misrepresented man, mis- 
represented the nature of the atonement between God 
and man, and throughout was about as erroneous as it is 
possible for any system to be. While I honestly thus 
think and write, I nevertheless believe that there are 
thousands of honest and intelligent, and pure-minded 
persons, who have been deluded by a system which has 
precious little truth in it. 



so REmmSCEFCES AND INCIDENTS 



CHAPTEK II. 

Preaching of the " Newlights," Bailey and Pancoast — Kentucky preach- 
ers of the B. W. Stone School — Personal Description of Elder 
John Secrest — His success in proselyting in Eastern Ohio — His 
interviews with AI/Exandee, Campbell — By him he was taught 
the design of Baptism — " Camp-meeting " — A Bishop there — Doubts 
and gloomy fears from false theology, etc. 

About the year 1825, new aspects of religious themes 
presented themselves to my mind. There came into our 
vicinity a man named Bailey. He professed to belong to 
a religious party called ^^ IS^ewlights.'^ He manifested 
great zeal, and preached with much fervor and pathos. 
A hymn-book which he had with him, published under 
the auspices of those with whom he stood connected, re- 
ligiously, contained a song of which every stanza ended 
with the line, " Come, join, and be a Newlight too ! '' 
The way to '^join^^ was "by the right hand of fellow- 
ship." He spoke freely, and as I then thought, ably, in 
opposition to human creeds ,and confessions of faith as 
bars of fellowship, and was the first man I ever heard 
take this position. He was much opposed to the popular 
sentiment in regard to the Trinity. He denounced the 
doctrine of the tri-personality of the Divine nature, and 
advocated some opposing speculation, I do not now re- 
member what, but I think he was Arian in regard to the 
sonship of the Son of God. He had the "mourner's 
bench " mode of " getting religion." 



I 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 31 

A number in the neighborhood indorsed him in what 
he said on the subject of human creeds. He went away, 
however, without effecting an organization upon his views 
of the Christian institution. 

The next man among the " Newlights " who followed 
him into our community, was one Joseph Pancoast. He 
was a tall, goodly-looking man, quite young ; but regarded 
by our native and rude critics as eminently talented, and 
thoroughly posted in the scriptures of truth. I remember 
what he read as a text : " Who is she that looketh forth 
as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and 
terrible as an army with banners?" He delivered but a 
single discourse, and I never saw him, nor heard of him 
afterwards- 
Next came some preachers from Kentucky, of the Bar- 
ton W, Stone school, among them James Hughes, Lewis 
Hambrick, Lewis Comer and John Secrest. These all 
preached with much pathos, denounced human creeds, and 
opposed the doctrine of the Trinity. They also prayed 
for and with mourners, and before they left us, they or- 
ganized a church, taking the members in by " The right 
hand of fellowship,'' and immersing such members as 
deemed it their duty to be baptized. They did not con- 
sider baptism essential either to salvation or church-mem- 
bership, and thus represented a command of the great 
Head of the Church as without significance or object. 
To be baptized was a simple, meaningless duty, because 
it was commanded by Christ. They held and practiced 
'^ feet- washing'' as an ordinance in the Church. 

Among the most powerful of these men, was John 
Secrest, a born and bred Kentuckian. In person, he was 
about five feet and ten inches in height, was squarely and 
compactly built, and \veighed about one hundred and 
ninety pounds- He wore his long, jet-black hair comb€d 



32 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

back from a broad, high forehead, and full, round, rather 
handsome face, of dark complexion. He had small, taper 
hands, like those of a lady, and very small feet for one 
of his size. Altogether his appearance was most prepos- 
sessing. His voice was clear, sonorous and enchanting as 
the "Music of the spheres.^' He had native talents of 
the first order, but his literary attainments were quite 
limited. He was willing to learn and adopt religious 
truth, as well as reject whatever he had of error. In the 
early part of the year 1827, he was preaching in eastern 
Ohio, and had succeeded in stirring up a great religious 
excitement. From his field of labor, he would go over 
into Virginia, to Buifalo Creek, at which place resided 
one Alexander Campbell, who was then editing and 
publishing a religious periodical, entitled " The Christian 
Baptist J^ Campbell had then come into some notice from 
having discussed the baptismal questions, on two occa- 
sions, with two Presbyterian clergymen, whom, it was 
said, he had vanquished. The first of these discussions 
he had with Eev. John Walker, of New Athens, Ohio, in 
the summer of 1820, at Mt. Pleasant, Ohio. The other 
was held at Augusta, Ky, in the fall of 1823, with Rev. 
Wm. L. McCalla. 

Secrest" loved to visit and talk with Campbell on the 
subject of the gospel of Christ, and from him he learned 
to view baptism in a light entirely different from that he 
had of it when I first heard him. Thousands of persons, 
in Belmont, Harrison, Guernsey, Monroe, Columbiana 
and other counties in Ohio, had made profession of re- 
ligion under his preaching, and were by him received into 
the church by the right hand of fellowship, and Avithout 
baptism at all. Having been taught the way of the Lord 
more perfectly, he went immediately to work to "Teach 
others also," and labored zealously with the members of 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 33 

churches he had organized, to show them the importance 
of baptism. He was able to convince and baptize the 
most of them, though some, who had been born and 
reared Quakers, refused what they called "water bap- 
tism,^^ as an outward, useless ceremony, and never were 
baptized at all. In the year 1828 — perhaps in the latter 
part of 1827 — Secrest preached, boldly and fearlessly, 
faith in Christ, repentance unto life, and immersion by 
the authority of Christ into the name of the Father, Son 
and Holy Spirit, in order to the remission of sins. In 
the course of two years, or less, he immersed, upon pro- 
fession of their faith in the Son of God, at least three 
thousand persons in eastern Ohio. Thus, at this early 
day in the history of the restoration of apostolic, primi- 
tive Christianity, was he actively in the service as an effi- 
cient preacher of the gospel. This was not in accordance 
with the practices of the Stone school. Whatever might 
have been the theory of B. W. Stone at this time, I am 
satisfied that sinners were not called upon by him to 
promptly obey the gospel. 

But again may I be permitted to speak of my own trials 
and efforts to become a Christian. A protracted meeting 
was to commence on the fourth or fifth day of August, 
1827, a few miles north-east of Barnesville, in Belmont 
County, Ohio, which was to be conducted by Elder John 
Secrest. A young man and I walked to this meeting to- 
gether, about six miles from my house. I paid strict at- 
tention to the preaching, praying, singing, and all other 
exercises of the meeting. For the first time in my life, I 
heard the gospel preached in its purity and simplicity. 
Elder Secrest preached Christ and him crucified as the 
object of faith. He taught that to believe Avith all the 
heart that Jesus is the Christ the Son of the Living God, 
upon the testimony which God has given in the divine 



34 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

record : of this truth, was true, saving, evangelical faith. 
That it was required of believers to repent ; that repent- 
ance was ceasing to do evil, and learning to do well ; that 
mere sorrow for sin was not the repentance required by 
the gospel; but that sorrow which produces reformation 
in heart and life is true, gospel repentance. All his prop- 
ositions were sustained by the Word of God, and made as 
clear to my mind as a sunbeam. Light from the oracles 
of God burst upon my enraptured mental vision, and my 
soul within me rejoiced in anticipation of becoming a 
Christian. I needed not to be convinced that I was a 
sinner, for I had groaned under this knowledge for years. 
I needed instruction as to how I might become a disciple 
of the Divine Redeemer. I now learned that there was no 
merit in repentance, none in faith, none in prayer, though 
these are all proper in their place, — merit belongs to the 
atoning blood of Christ, and in him only is redemption. 
I said mentally Christ died not to reconcile the Father, 
but to reconcile the world to God. My previous difficulty 
as to what faith is, how it is obtained, and how it is to be 
used when obtained, now vanished as the mists of the 
morning before the king of day. Repentance, I now saw, 
was not penance, nor deep sorrow, but that change which 
embraces Christ, and results in reformation by following 
him practically. I was then ready to say from my heart, 
deep down — 

"Here, Lord, I give myself away ; 
'Tis all that I can do." 

Accordingly, on the 6th of August, 1827, I gave my hand, 
as a token that I had resolved to be a disciple of Christ. 
On the next day I was immersed, with a number of others, 
by Elder Secrest, who, on that same day and the next, 
immersed seventy persons on a profession of their faith in 
the Divine Redeemer. AYhen the meeting closed, I went 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 35 

home with a light and joyful heart. The corroding fears 
that had annoyed and distressed me so long, were gone, 
all my doubts and difficulties had fled, and I felt that I 
could indeed ^^read my title clear to mansions in the 
skies." 

Now that the gospel was plain to me, unmixed wdth 
human philosophy and metaphysical speculation, it ap- 
peared so grand and beautiful, that I w-as impelled to run 
every-where and tell the sweet and simple story of the 
cross. I believed that many of my fellow-men were har- 
assed by the same difficulties which had troubled me, and 
that there w-ere many thousands who would become Chris- 
tians if they knew the w^ay. Therefore, with all my in- 
experience and diffidence, and not without deeply realiz- 
ing my want of knowledge of the ways of the world, I 
was resolved, trusting in God, and leaning upon Christ, to 
take up my cross and preach to sinners the same Ee- 
deemer in whom I had found such consolation and joy. 
Long did the w^ords of the song, which was sung at the 
meeting ring in my ears ; indeed, they still ring as clearly 
as of old : 

"Then glad I came to him, blest Lamb! 
• And made confession of His name; 

Myself alone had I to give: 
Nothing but love did I receive. 

Now will I tell to sinners round 
What a dear Saviour I have found; 
I'll point to thv redeeming blood, 
And say : Behold the way to God." 

Being impelled from a sense of obligation and duty — the 
next thing to a special call to preach the gospel — I com- 
menced at once, on the next Lord's day after my baptism, 
to exhort and pray in public. I knew I w^as not able to 
speak by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit; but as a 
faithful man, I thought I would be able, by study, to 



36 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

learn and re-proclaim the ancient gospel. I commenced 
to speak publicly in our own neighborhood, where we had 
formed an organization known as the Church of Christ or 
of God. Taking a scriptural name, and laying aside all 
human theories, confessions of faith, and standards of 
every kind — for union with us one needed only faith in 
Jesus Christ, and obedience to his authority — opinions 
were to be held as private property, and not to be ad- 
vanced by any as bonds of union or communion. We 
said to each other, as Jehu said to Jehonadab : " Is thine 
heart right, as my heart is with thy heart ? If it be, give 
me thine hand.^^ 

When I look back to the days of my childhood and 
youth, and call to mind the systems of theology which 
were in vogue before there had been any modification of 
them, such as has taken place since the effort to restore 
primitive Christianity, I feel that I can never be suffi- 
ciently thankful for that train of providences which led 
me into the marvelous light of the gospel, and dispelled 
the gloomy clouds that hung over and around my young 
mind. Bound hand and foot, in the chains forged by 
philosophizing metaphysicians, when these were stricken 
from me by the hammer of God^s unsophisticated word, 
I bounded as a roe and leaped as an hart. Speculatists, 
under a pretext of making plain the mysteries of the 
system of God, have invented difficulties a hundred-fold 
worse than any they pretend to explain. Take, for 
instance, the modus operandi by which the Methodist 
teachers undertake to make Christians, and this was the 
system and theirs the teaching under which I endeavored, 
for many weary months, to find peace. They teach the 
sentiment, and hold it tenaciously, that Christ died for all 
men, irrespective of rank, condition, nation or color. 
This proposition is, no doubt, in accordance with the 



« 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 37 

teaching of the Holy Scriptures. . It is, indeed, the 
plain, unmistakable teaching of "the inspired writers. 
But, secondly, the Methodist philosophers hold, teach, 
and preach that all men, by nature, are, hereditarily, 
totally depraved, and that no one can be saved until this 
depravity is removed. But, being totally depraved, man 
can do nothing of himself for this removal, nor can he 
do any thing acceptable to God until it is removed. 
Man is dead in sin, as Lazarus was dead physically, and 
naught but an act of omnipotence can give life in the 
one case any more than in the other. The Scripture 
of truth is a dead letter, ''mere words/^ impotent, in- 
operative; and nothing but a direct application of the 
power of the Holy Spirit can regenerate, create anew 
the totally dead sinner. To coldly ask the question : 
.What, under such circumstances, can the lost sinner do? 
but poorly conveys to one who never realized it the 
utter hopelessness and misery felt by one whom sin had 
driven to despair, and who sought in vain for an answer. 
The more anxious he is to do something, the more hope- 
less he feels ; for no rational mind can suggest any other 
answer but that nothing, absolutely nothing, can be 
done by a dead man ; and worse, in this respect, spirit- 
ually, than Lazarus was physically, nothing is to be 
done for him until he does this unknown and impossible 
something for himself. Here we see a man converted, 
regenerated, made a new creature, there a woman, yonder 
another ; and when we ask how this was done, we are 
told "by the direct, immediate influence of the Holy 
Spirit." Here is a man not saved, not regenerated; 
there another, and another. "Why not? Because the 
Holy Spirit has not seen fit to change, to renovate the 
heart. No other rational reason can be given on the 
basis of this theory. If it be true, that when the sinner 



38 BEMimSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

is called upon to come to God and be saved, he can 
have no will to come until his depravity is removed by a 
direct operation of the Holy Spirit, how can he be re- 
sponsible for his depravity? And if it is total depravity, 
what is left of a man when this totality is removed ? 

The Methodist theory pretends antagonism to the 
Calvinistic theory, yet in the end it reaches precisely the 
same result. They seem to commence as wide apart as 
the poles, but they both " run into the ground ^^ at the 
same equator. They differ in their verbiage — in their 
statements and proof-texts — but in their conclusion on 
the main, the great point — the salvation of sinners — they 
differ not at all. Under both systems, the salvation of 
any sinner, personally, is the result of a nondescript, 
abstract, immediate influence of the Holy Spirit, over 
which operation the totally depraved sinner has no 
control. It is fatalism, nothing less, disguise and sugar- 
coat it as they may, still it is fatalism. Under such a 
system was I brought up, from infancy. I could not be 
comforted by it. I saw no ground upon which to stand, 
and look for deliverance and salvation, until my load of 
guilt was_ removed by the energizing and powerful oper- 
ation of the Holy Spirit, abstract and immediate, and by 
impact upon my literally dead and powerless spirit. 
In those days, dreams, visions, and apparitions were 
sought for and relied on. Hymns and songs were read 
and sung, in accordance with these irrational and un- 
scriptural ideas. Professed Christians would join in 
devoutly singing such lines as these : 

"Oh, that my load of sin were gone! 
Oh, that I could at last submit 
At Jesus' feet to lay it down, 
To lay my soul at Jesus' feet ! 



I 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PBEACEEE. 39 

Kest for my soul I long to find : 
Saviour of all, if mine thou art, 
Give me thy meek and lowly mind. 
And stamp thine image on my heart." 

All manifesting a religious theory fraught with fears, 
and uncertainties, and gloomy doubts, unworthy of a 
kind Heavenly Father, and unsuited to his dependent 
creature, man. How unlike the primitive gospel, which 
gives an assurance of the pardon of past sins, beyond all 
doubt, and above all fear ! 

But to proceed with the story of my commencement 
in the cause of Christ as a public speaker: Some friends 
of the cause near Barnesville invited me to make an ap- 
pointment in that neighborhood, and come up and preach 
for them. I agreed to do so, and gave the appointment 
for the second Lord's day in October, 1827, a little over 
two months after my immersion. At the appointed time, 
the meeting was held in brother James Lawhead's dwell- 
ing-house, one mile north of Barnesville, Belmont County, 
Ohio. It is impossible to describe my emotions on the 
occasion. Naturally bashful, timid, and retiring, with 
no one by to take my place, should I make an entire 
failure, I think nothing but love to God, and a most 
earnest desire to do his will and be instrumental in sav- 
ing sinners, could have induced me to enter upon the 
responsible work I then and there began. 

The time came to open the meeting, and I was there, 
by an appointment, to conduct the services, whatever 
they might be. The people were there, too, a multitude 
of all ages and of both sexes; and I, a mere inexperi- 
enced boy of nineteen, was expected to lead the devo- 
tions of all, and to entertain and instruct as many as I 
could by an ex tempore discourse. No money could have 
induced me to undertake the task which I had before 



40 BEmmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

me, or to endure the anxiety I experienced in regard to 
my ability to get through it at all. I arose and ^^ opened 
the meeting," not having as much difficulty as I antici- 
pated; and after singing and prayer, I read a few verses, 
and commenced my ^^ first sermon.'^ 

My text was 1 Cor. ix. 24. 25: "Know ye not, that 
they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the 
prize? So run, that ye may obtain. And every man 
that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things, 
I^ow they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but 
we an incorruptible." Glancing at the face of a clock 
which was standing in the room, I noticed accurately 
the time, and then all external circumstances were 
forgotten in my devotion to the theme and ray em- 
barrassment under the novelty of my position. "When 
I pronounced the last sentence of my discourse, I glanced 
again at the clock, and saw, with surprise and delight, 
that I had spoken so as to. command the respectful and 
silent attention of my congregation for three quarters 
of an hour. 

Often since has that same text furnished the founda- 
tion of discourses for me, and no doubt I greatly im- 
proved in the handling of the theme, but never have I 
sat down with the same feeling of satisfaction which I 
enjoyed then. I had not made a failure, and I had 
stronger hopes now than ever that I could make my 
limited abilities useful to my fellow-man, and to the 
cause- of the Master, by studying and preaching the un- 
searchable riches of Christ. 

This discourse will be found in that part of this work 
set apart for sermons, not in the language in which it 
was then delivered, but as nearly the same, in substance, 
as I can well reproduce it, after the better part of half 
a century of preaching upon the same general theme, 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 41 

during all of which time I have availed myself of such 
advantages for improvement as my circumstances and 
means could command. 

I remained at home through the winter of 1827-8, 
working for father, at various odd jobs, through the 
weeks, and preaching some, at different points, on Lord's 
days. The last w^ork I did at home for my father, was 
to make and put upon his house a new shingle roof. 
Soon after I had completed this work, I left the family 
circle, never again to be an inmate of my father's house, 
except as a transient visitor, though this was neither 
foreseen nor intended at the time I w^ent away. 

The circumstance which led me from home was this: 
John Secrest had been very successful in gaining pros- 
elytes in the counties of Jefferson and Harrison, Ohio, and 
by this had stirred up much hostility against him among 
the " orthodox '' clergy. A reverend gentleman of the 
Lutheran persuasion, particularly, had become very mad 
against him, and in order to destroy his influence, and 
stop the progress of the cause he advocated, circulated 
false and slanderous reports against his Christian char- 
acter, to the effect that his reputation w^as so infamous in 
Kentucky that he was compelled to leave the State, run- 
ning away and abandoning his wife, and stealing a horse. 
Secrest felt that the interest of the cause he preached 
required that these charges should be investigated in 
some way that would put the public in possession of the 
facts. In order to this end, he instituted an action in 
the court of Jefferson County, Ohio. It became neces- 
sary to secure testimony to be offered in the trial of this 
suit, in the locality where the enormities with which he 
was charged were said to have been committed. Accord- 
ingly, he took out a rule of court to take depositions of 
witnesses in Kentucky, in July, 1828. For the purpose 
4 



42 BE3IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

of taking these depositions, he was now about to make 
a journey to that State, and desired me to accompany 
him, offering to furnish me with a horse, saddle and 
bridle. Being anxious to go, I obtained permission 
from my father, as I was yet a minor, and while wait- 
ing for Secrest to call for me, I busied myself in mak- 
ing the necessary preparations for the journey. I had 
not such clothing as I deemed suitable, and I bargained 
with a man to cut logs on his " clearing,^' at fifty cents 
per day; he, being a shoemaker, contracted to furnish 
me with a pair of boots, and pay me the balance in 
money. When- the work was done, and the end I had 
in view reached, I was provided with a suit of satinet, 
a new pair of boots, a broad-brimmed, dove-colored, 
rabbit-fur hat, which cost two dollars; and with other 
little etceteras^ I felt amply prepared to go into any 
society. In June, Secrest came with the promised horse, 
and we set out for Kentucky. 

In this way I left home, with all its dear and inex- 
pressibly tender associations, never again to be a member 
of that household. An affectionate father's and a loved 
and loving mother's prayers were preferred to a throne of 
grace for the protection of a son who was to be thrown 
among strangers in a strange land " to preach his way." 
They had nothing else to give. I have omitted to state, 
that early in the movement which I have elsewhere de- 
tailed, which was made in our neighborhood, both my 
parents had joined in with it heartily, and been immersed. 

Elder Secrest and I made our way down through the 
hill country, stopping but little, except to stay over night, 
till we arrived at McConnelsville, the seat of justice of 
Morgan County. Here he left an appointment to return 
in a few days and preach, and we continued our journey 
up the Muskingum River to ZanesvDle. where we held a 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 43 

meeting in the court-house. We then crossed to the Put- 
nam side of the river, and stopped with Brother Dudley, 
at whose ]3lace I was to remain a few days, while Secrest 
returned to McConnelsville to fill his appointment, with 
the understanding that he and I would meet again at a 
Mr. Green's, three miles west of New Lancaster. Thurs- 
day came, and Avas excessively sultry, proving to be the 
hottest day of the season. I reached the point agreed 
upon, but was greatly disappointed when the day wore 
away, and Secrest failed to make his appearance. I man- 
aged to fill the appointment which we had sent to preach, 
with Father Green^s assistance, who delivered a fine ex- 
hortation after I had preached a short discourse. About 
nine o'clock next morning, Secrest arrived, having been 
compelled to stop twelve miles short of our appointment, 
on account of the exhaustion of his horse. 

From this point, we went on by way of Circleville, 
New London, Hillsboro', Georgetown, and to Maysville, 
where we crossed the Ohio Eiver, and, keeping on, we 
reached Flemingsburg at eleven o'clock at night, having 
traveled seventy- five miles without stopping, except to get 
dinner and feed our horses. At Flemingsburg, we stopped 
with Mr. Eckols, a brother-in-law of Secrest, he being 
married to Secrest's sister. The next day, being the 4th 
of July, we went three miles to a brick meeting-house, 
where an appointment had been sent in advance. Here I 
made the acquaintance of Delany R. Eckols and his 
amiable wife. He had been admitted to the bar as an 
attorney-at-law, but more recently had commenced preach- 
ing the gospel. His intention was, as he informed me, to 
abandon the practice of law entirely and preach the 
word. The Kentuckians, at this time, were in the full 
tide of a political excitement — Thomas Metcalfe and 
William T. Barry being rival candidates for the guberna- 



44 BEMIXISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

torial cluiir of the State. We found the people then, as 
now, more easily aroused and enlisted in the affairs of this 
world than in the matters of eternal interest. The poli- 
tics of earthly governments were more interesting and 
exciting than the politics of the kingdom of heaven. 

After the ostensible object of our journey had been ac- 
complished, by securing the desired depositions, we trav- 
eled and preached in the counties of Bath, Nicholas, 
Scott, Bourbon, and Mason; and at Carlisle, the county 
seat of Bourbon County, we found Elder John Rogers and 
Barton W. Stone engaged in a protracted meeting, which 
was being held in a grove. I heard Elder Stone and 
Elder Joseph Marsh each deliver a discourse at this meet- 
ing. Marsh was then a young man, and no one could 
have imagined from his discourse that he would become 
a virulent opponent of the apostolic teaching as to the 
design of baptism, which many years afterwards he did, 
when he was, for a time, editor of the " Clwistian Pal- 
ladium.'^^ Elder Stone read and commented upon the last 
chapter of Revelation, founding his principal remarks 
upon the following words : ^' Behold, I come quickly : and 
my reward is with me, to give to every man according as 
his work shall be." He made two points, and offered crit- 
icisms. First, he did not understand the word quickly as 
expressing the time when, but the celerity with which the 
Saviour would move after leaving the mediatorial throne. 
He also said these scriptures taught that there will be de- 
grees of punishment in the future state; and as additional 
proof of this proposition, he cited Christ's language in 
regard to Bethsaida and Chorazin, — that it would be 
more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of 
judgment, than for those cities which had witnessed his 
miracles and wonderful works, and rejected him. He 
also made a point on the statement that men will be re- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 45 

warded according a-s their works shall be. Orthodoxy 
is not, said he, to be the criterion. Being sound in the 
modern systems of theology will not avail when the Judge 
comes to reward men according as their works shall be. 

He was listened to with profound respect and most 
courteous attention. While Macneamer, Thompson, Mar- 
shall, and Dunlavy, who came out with Elder Stone from 
Presbyterianism, and with him declared in favor of the 
Bible alone as the rule of faith and manners, had aban- 
doned this ground, he stood firm in the midst of much 
opposition to the day of his death; and in a good old 
age departed this life, lamented by thousands who had 
heard his eloquent appeals in favor of the unsophisticated 
word of God, freed from human creeds and human folly. 
I conceived at this time a very high opinion of his piety 
and peaceful disposition. 

From the Carlisle meeting we directed our way back to 
eastern Ohio. There accompanied us from Kentucky 
Elder James Hughes, and from southern Ohio Elder 
Samuel Rogers, two good and faithful pioneers in the ef- 
fort to restore the Bible to the people, unshackled by hu- 
man traditions. On the route home, we stopped with the 
"White Pilgrim,^' Elder Joseph Thomas. He received 
the cognomen " white pilgrim," from the circumstance of 
his wearing white apparel both summer and winter. He 
was something of a poet, and read to us quite a number 
of his productions. After reading a poem, he w^ould sit 
back and remark, " That is pretty good poetry for long- 
haired Joseph Thomas to make, is it not?" He wore his 
hair long, combed back, and reaching down upon his 
shoulders. It was while standing by his grave, that El- 
der John Ellis conceived the idea of writing the poetry, 
which I find in some of our popular music books, com- 
mencing : "I came to the spot where the white pilgrim lay." 



46 JREMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

Suffice it to say, that somewhere in central Ohio, breth- 
ren Secrest and Hughes parted company with Brother 
Rogers and me, and went by way of Zanesville, while 
we went by McConnelsville and the Meigs Creek country, 
and joined them again in Belmont County. I reached 
home safely after this, my first tour of any considerable 
length, and I need not say that I was glad, and gladly 
received by those dear ones at home, who had gone on 
with their domestic affairs, bearing the burthen and heat 
of each day, in honest toil for a subsistence from mother 
earth. 

Remaining but a few days at home, I started again to 
proclaim the unsearchable riches of Christ, and made a 
tour through the north part of Belmont County into Har- 
rison, Columbiana, Stark, Tuscarawas, and other counties. 
Wherever there was fitting opportunity I preached the 
"ancient gospel," as we called it, in opposition to the 
modern sectarian exhibitions called gospel. 

Thus, in my humble way, I endeavored to carry out the 
purpose of my life, to save sinners, by inducing them to 
become followers of the Son of God ; and so the year 1828 
passed away, leaving me not only fully resolved on preach- 
ing the gospel, but fully engaged in the work. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER, 47 



CHAPTEE III. 

Started to attend the debate between Campbell and Owen — Preached at 
Wolf Creek — Sunday Creek — Thence we went to Eutland, Meigs 
County, Ohio — Attended a Union meeting of Immersionists — Great 
excitement — Conflict between the ancient and modern gospels — 
Triumph of the former — Moved on westerly — Stopped at Antioch 
meeting-house — At Shakertown — And arrived safe at Cincinnati in 
time for the debate. 

In the month of March, 1829, in company with my 
elder brother, James G. Mitchell, I left Belmont County, 
Ohio, for the purpose of going to Cincinnati, to attend a 
debate which was appointed to commence on the 13th of 
April, between Robert Owen, of New Lanark, Scotland, 
and Alexander Campbell, of Buffalo, Virginia. I was 
twenty-one years old the day before, and had been en- 
gaged in public speaking for about eighteen months. My 
brother had been longer in the public service, having 
been with Brother Walter Scott in his great campaign 
in 1827, through the Western Reserve, Ohio — the first 
public exhibition 'practically to restore the great law of 
pardon to sinners under the gospel dispensation since 
the apostasy from primitive Christianity and apostolic 
teaching. 

The first day we made the distance of forty miles, on 
horseback, without once alighting, and stopped at night 
with Brother Burton, on the waters of Wills' Creek, 
where we were kindly received and entertained. In that 
direction there was no family that professed Christianity, 



48 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

according to apostolic teaching, until we reached Brother 
Burton's. Next day we proceeded in a southerly direc- 
tion, reaching Brother DevolPs in the evening, who was 
the maternal grandfather of Benjamin Franklin, of the 
^^ American Christian Review, ^^ as I learned long after- 
wards, from Brother Franklin. Here was a home for 
weary preachers of the apostolic gospel, who were always 
kindly cared for and hospitably entertained. I had 
stopped here the year before, on my way to Kentuck^^ 
The old gentleman was tall and broad-shouldered, with 
stern and firm purposes. He was one of the pioneers in 
that still comparatively new region. He lived on the 
w^aters of Duck Creek. Many of the sturdy forest trees 
had fallen before the stroke of his ax, and the wilderness 
had become fruitful fields. He and his family were 
quietly enjoying the fruits of their honest toil, and re- 
membered their obligations to Him who giveth all things 
richly to enjoy. 

From Brother DevolPs we started westerly, through 
mud and mire, over hills and along ravines, along narrow 
passes, across deep, and now swollen, streams, through 
which we sometimes forded, and sometimes were obliged 
to swim, our horses. Bridges were few and far between 
in those days through that region. In the evening we 
reached Brother Skivington's, both wet and weary, and 
were kindly cared for. At this place, there resided an 
old man named Williams, who was ninety years old. He 
was born among the Indians on the Tuscarawas River, 
his mother being a white captive among these natives 
of the forest, and his father a full-blood Indian. She 
had told her son the story of her abduction from her peo- 
ple among the hills of Virginia, and her cruel captivity 
among the savages. This aroused in his youthful bosom 
a sentiment of intense hostility against his paternal kin- 



IN THE LIFE OF jl FIONEER FREACIIER. 49 

dred, and he resolved to avenge her wrongs upon the 
heads of his. father's race. This resolution was carried 
out to the letter. In his old age, he declared that he 
could not possibly tell how many Indians had fallen by 
his hand. He had often swam the Ohio, Muskingum, 
and other rivers, with gun and ammunition, keeping all 
perfectly dry; which he accomplished by constructing a 
raft on which he laid them, and pushed altogether 
through the water, with his chin, as he swam. He would 
skulk about the camps of the red men, learn their plans, 
numbers and position, and retreat in safety, possessed of 
valuable information for their foes. During the war with 
England in 1812-'15, he thus rendered material assistance 
to the country. He was finally captured, tried, convicted 
and condemned to death as a spy. But being permitted 
to choose between being shot and receiving one hundred 
lashes on his bare back, he made choice of the latter, re- 
ceived the flogging, survived all, and had attained, at the 
time I. saw him, the good old age of ninety years. 

From Skivington-'s we proceeded toward Brother Ellis's, 
on Wolf Creek, in Morgan County, w^here we arrived 
safely, and held a meeting for a few days ; at which a 
man something over six feet high, and weighing two hun- 
dred and fifty-five pounds, came forward and made the 
good confession. I had not yet baptized any one. My 
brother, who was not quite as large as I, asked me whethetr 
I thought I could baptize so large a person. I replied that 
I had no doubt that I can. So we went "down into" 
Wolf Creek, where I buried him with Christ in baptism. 
It was well done, and without any difficulty an my part. 

From this point, we journeyed on to Sunday Creek, 
ia Athens County, Ohio, where we remained and pro- 
tracted a meeting for a few days, making sister Lydia 
Nye's house our head-quarters. She was ^ noble spirit. 
5 



50 EEIIINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

Her husband had been a Christian preacher, but had fallen 
asleep in Jesus and gone to his reAvard. Her house was 
the preacher's home, and her heart and hand were ever 
ready to do any thing within her power for the c^use of 
the Eedeemer. At this meeting a number were baptized 
for the remission of sins. I do not now remember how 
many. 

We departed from this 23lace, and under the pilotage 
of Brother John Pugsley, proceeded to Rutland Corners, 
in Meigs Count}^, Ohio, and were taken by him to the 
house of his brother James, where we were expected to 
make ourselves at home during the continuance of a 
union meeting which was appointed to begin the next 
day. This meeting was to be a free affair, to all who be- 
lieved that immersion was the only baptism, and believers 
the only scriptural subjects of Christian baptism. Next 
day, being Saturday, there assembled in the academy at 
^^the corners'' a goodly number of persons. There were 
Free-Will Baptists, Calvinistic Baptists, some of the 
" Christian Order/' and preachers of all three of these 
denominations; besides elders, deacons, pastors, "grave 
and reverend seigniors," old women and maidens, boys 
and girls, merchants and mechanics, farmers and physi- 
cians, all attending together the " union meeting." 

The religious exercises were commenced, in an orderly 
w^ay, by reading, singing and prayer. Xext in order were 
"Christian experiences," when all were cordially invited 
to say something for the Lord and his cause. There was 
a lively and good feeling pervading the- assembly. The 
brethren and sisters spoke freely and' feelingly for a con- 
siderable time, when there occurred a longer interval of 
silence than usual. Elder B. H. Miles, of the Christian 
Church, arose, and with measured words and dignified 
looks (he was a handsome man) said : 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 51 

" I have arisen from my seat for the purpose of giving 
my testimony in favor of the cause of God^ and to speak 
of the dealings of the Lord with me. But if any thing 
be revealed to any one that sitteth by^ let the first hold 
his peace, for ye may all speak one at a time. The spirit 
of the prophets is subject to the prophets.^^ 

He made a few further remarks, and but a very few, 
when an old lady, supposing she had a revelation, was 
soon on her feet, and began to tell what the Lord had 
done for her. The Rev. Miles, of course, took his seat 
until the lady was through delivering the revelation, then 
gravely arose and resumed his harangue. It seemed, 
when he concluded, that all had spoken who were likely 
to speak of those who resided in the vicinity and circum- 
jacent country. One of the elders then arose, and ex- 
tended the invitation to speak to strangers — "to those 
living at a distance who might, in the course of Prov- 
idence, be in the meeting.^^ This was well understood 
by my brother and myself. He arose and at once, with- 
out exordium or other preliminary, attacked fiercely Rev. 
Miles' absurd application of the passage quoted from first 
Corinthians. He then affirmed that if the passage were 
applicable, as the gentleman understood it, the lady had 
no revelation. There was nothing at all revealed to her, 
therefore she should have remained quiet until the gen- 
tleman was through w^ith his remarks. He then pro- 
ceeded to speak substantially as follows : 

"You convert a person from atheism to deism, it 
would accomplish no good for the convert or any one 
else. Again, you may convert a person from deism or 
atheism to universalism; still no good accrues to the 
convert from such conversion, nor to any one else." 

Just as this sentence was uttered, a gentleman, seated 
some ten feet from the speaker, broke out: 



52 REmmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

^'1 would thank you, sir, not to rank universalists 
with deists and atheists ! " 

^^ Hold your jaw ! ^^ was the prompt response of the 
orator, "until I get through ;^^ at the same time shaking 
his fist at the gentleman Avith a most significant glance 
of his keen gray eye, as much as to say, " I am not to be 
interrupted by listeners while I have the floor.^' 

The gentleman turned pale, looked abashed, and cow- 
ered under this genteel rebuke. He did not run, how- 
ever, but maintained his seat until the session closed, 
which was immediately after my brother concluded his 
speech, meeting having first been appointed for the even- 
ing. 

At the hour appointed, a large concourse of people had 
aSvSembled, and considerable excitement began to get up. 
Just as my brother and I were going into the meeting, 

in company with a Mr. S , the lady who thought she 

had a revelation at the time Rev. Miles was speaking, had 
the floor, and was in the midst of an inflammatory speech. 
Her remarks appeared to be principally directed against 
the young interlopers, heretics and " Campbellites,^^ Avho 
had come down from the north. At the time we entered, 
she was remarking about as follows : " 1 knew they were 
wicked and black-hearted men when they came into the 
meeting to-day. I knew they were, from my feelings I ^' 

emphasizing feelings. Our friend, Mr. S , who was 

close beside us, said: "Never mind a Avoman^s clack.'^ 
" We are not very scary,^^ replied my brother, and we 
passed in and took seats in the audience. Some exhorta- 
tions, songs and prayers were next had, after which it 
was proposed by the managers that my brother or I be 
requested to preach. After a minute^s consultation, it was 
agreed to between us that I should preach, which I ac- 
cordingly did, delivering a discourse without saying any 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 53 

thing which could reasonably be construed as against the 
most orthodox sentiments. Soon after the discourse, the 
audience was dismissed, meeting being announced for the 
next morning at 10 o'clock. 

It was ascertained by Mr. B , the man my brother 

had so courteously ordered to hold his jaw; Mr. H , 

the principal of the academy and a graduate of a college 

at Dumfries, Scotland; and Mr. S , the same who had 

told us not to mind a woman's clack — neither of whom 
belonged to any church organization — that a secret meet- 
ing had been held by the managers, in which some things 
had been done which concerned my brother and myself. 
It was resolved that neither of us should be permitted to 
preach the next day. Our three friends were resolved 
that we should, and agreed upon the following pro- 
gramme. Mr. B had a new building in course of 

erection, of which the frame was up, a roof on, and the 
loNver floor laid. They determined to seat this with the 
loose boards lying around, send out runners early in the 
morning through the surrounding country, and invite the 
people in to ^^ the corners,'' to hear the strange preachers. 
In pursuance of this programme of the shrewd trio, who 
were resolved on defeating the plan of the elders, horses 
were furnished, and messengers sent out in every direc- 
tion in the morning, with instructions to announce 
wherever they went that two boys had come down from 
the north, who were about four feet in height, and were 
the greatest preachers that had ever spoken at Rutland 
Corners. While this mission was being fulfilled, men 
were busily engaged in putting up seats in the new build- 
ing, which by 9 o'clock A. M. were ready to be occupied. 
This building was distant about one hundred and fifty 
yards from the academy. There were three principal 
roads which centered near the latter, the new building 



54 BEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

being a little north of the road leading from the west. 
All these thoroughfares were soon crowded with the peo- 
ple, who came pouring in from every quarter ; in wagons, 
on horseback and on foot, men, women and children, and 
rendezvoused at the new building. It was soon apparent 
that this was the center of attraction, and it was rather 
amusing to witness the sad countenances and elongated 
visages of the Regular and Free-Will Baptists, elders and 
deacons, as they stood about the door of the academy 
and beheld the passing crowd which was flowing on to 
the new house, to hear ^' the boys '^ preach the ^^ new 
gospel." 

Seeing the turn things were taking, and realizing the 
impossibility of getting any but a select few to meet at 
the academy, they made a virtue of necessity, and dis- 
patched a committee to wait upon the managers of the 
opposition forces, with the request that the meetings be 
consolidated, with the understanding that one of ^^the 
boys" should preach. This proposition was promptly 
accepted, and the congregation notified that the preach- 
ing would be in the academy, when immediately there 
was a general stampede for that building, which Avas 
soon filled to overflowing, few but females getting seats 
in the house — the gallantry of the gentlemen leading them 
to remain outside, where they occupied low seats on the 
ground, or stood, as they preferred. 

My brother stood upon the sill of the door, read the 
last chapter of E-evelation, and preached three hours and 
a quarter to the attentive and listening multitude. No 
one appeared to be tired or out of patience. After the 

discourse, deacon B arose, thrust his hands down 

deep into his trowsers pockets, closed his eyes as tightly 
as he could contract the muscles, opened his mouth and 
said : " Friends and brethren ; we have heard the truth 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 55 

to-day. The brother has handled the gospel in a very 
able manner to-day, and we shall all do well to take 
heed to it." Thus indorsing all that was really hereti- 
cal; because my brother had taken sufficient time to 
elaborate the great principles of primitive Christianity, as 
contrasted with the modern gospels, which were current 
and popular. This defeat of the elders gave us the en- 
tire field, and all the region round about. 

AVe continued preaching every night in some school- 
house or dwelling house in different directions from the 
academy, and returned on the next Lord's day to the 
^^ Corners," where we held forth again. During our 
stay a number came forward, made the good confession, 
and were baptized in order to the remission of sins. 
This was doubtless the first time in the history of hu- 
manity that believing, repentant souls responded the 
same day, and even the same hour of the night, to the 
invitation of the gospel in the solemn ordinance of bap- 
tism, for the remission of sins, in this vicinity. 

On one occasion, Avhen my brother was giving an in- 
vitation to sinners to come and manifest their willingness 
to obey the Saviour, a sister of B. H. Miles, a young lady 
of some eighteen or twenty summers, responded to the 
invitation. He was much affected, and whispered sofRy 
in my ear, ^^I do not know whether this is right or not; 
but, at any rate, baptize all you can." I think this is his 
language verbatim. Poor man, he afterwards ignored 
God's plan of saving sinners, and continued until his 
death to fraternize with the "Christian order." He 
died comparatively young. Of the preachers we pressed 
in this encounter — Elisha Kathburn and Barzillah H. 
Miles, of the " Christian order " — the former received 
cordially the ^' aneient gospel/^ and became its ardent sup- 
porter and advocate. He wa^ a man of fervent piety 



56 EEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

and ardent affections. His exemplary life was a constant 
commendation of the power and salutary influence of the 
gospel of the grace of God. He lived to do much good, 
and had the pleasure of seeing many of his neighbors 
obey the truth. He was an octogenarian at the time of^ 
and before, his departure. There was also an Elder Cald- 
well, of the Christian order, from Tupper's Plains, pres- 
ent at the the commencement of the cannonading ; but J 
think he retired from the field after the first defeat, and 
probably claimed the victory. There were Elders Sted- 
man and Hovey, of the Regular Baptist denomination. 
These were of more note and repute than some others 
who were public speakers. Suffice it to say, that the victory 
was so complete that the "ancient gospel" was firmly 
fixed in the hearts of many in that neighborhood, and 
the cause remains fixed there until this day. 

From Rutland Corners we took up our line of march 
in a westerly direction. We passed out of Meigs into 
Jackson County, over the rugged hills and bluffs of Big 
Raccoon Creek over to Salt Creek; passed through Chilli- 
cothe, up the Scioto River to Deer Creek, and stopped 
with Elder James Burbridge. Here was a congregation 
of the "Christian order ;'^ but they were much attached 
to the word of God, and ready to receive cordially those 
who ignored human creeds and venerated the Bible. 
Brother Burbridge was a preacher, a very large man, 
raised in Kentucky, was a tanner by trade, and a good 
man. AYhile we were with him, he related to us the 
following anecdote : 

"After I removed to Ohio, I professed religion, as the 
plirase goes, and commeneed to advocate its claims pub- 
licly. After I had preached a short time, I returned to 
Kentucky on a visit to my friends and relatives. Having 
stopped with one of my brothers, I was one day accosted 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 57 

by him something after the following style: 'Well, Jim, 
you have got to be a preacher! I am told you preach; 
is it true?^ 

" ' Yes/ I replied, ' I try to preach a little about home/ 

"'Well, Jim, you are called of God to preach, are you 
not?^ said he. 

"'Yes,' was my answer, 'I think I am/ 

"'Then,' said he, 'I'll have you preach here in my 
house on next Sunday. I will send word around, notify 
the people, and have preaching here next Sunday morn- 
ing.' 

'"Oh, don't do it,' responded I; 'I should be so em- 
barrassed here where I was brought up, and among my 
old neighbors and companions, that I should not be able 
to say any thing.' 

"'Jim,' he replied, 'a man whom God has called to 
preach, can preach anywhere. You've got to preach for 
us on Sunday next.' 

"Accordingly, he sent out through the neighborhood, 
and told the people that his brother Jim was visiting' at 
his house, and would preach there on Sunday morning. 
Sunday came, the hour appointed for the meeting ar- 
rived, and the people flocked in to hear James Bur- 
bridge preach. The house was filled with white people, 
and the door-yard with negroes. I commenced with 
some trepidation, and soon became so much embarrassed 
that I scarcely knew where I was, or what I was doing. 
After a little while I became more calm and self-possessed, 
and found that I had unconsciously taken off my coat and 
vest, and had my shirt-sleeves rolled up above my elbows. 
The whites inside, were, many of them, bathed in tears, 
and the blacks in the yard were nearly frantic — ^jumping, 
shouting, and crying. I never witnessed such a time 
before or since." 



58 EE3nNISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

This well illustrates the effect produced upon an en- 
thusiastic nature by the delusion of a ^^ special call" to 
preach the gospel, which Brother Burbridge learned to 
appreciate and understand fully when he came to know 
"the way of the Lord more perfectly." 

Having remained here a few days, and preached 
on several occasions to attentive congregations in the 
Deer Creek meeting-house, Avho appeared to receive the 
"ancient gospel" with all readiness, we left the hospi- 
table home of Brother Burbridge and proceeded on our 
journey. We passed on, over very heavy roads, until 
we reached the neighborhood of Antioch meeting-house, 
in Clinton County. This was a house of brick and 
mortar, owned by tlie " Christian order." 

Somewhere in this region, we stopped with Brother 
William Irvin, a preacher who had fallen in with the 
movement to restore primitive Christianity. He was a 
live man, possessed good native talents, and being most 
sincerely devoted to the Saviour and the cause of truth, 
he was an able advocate of the gospel. More than forty 
years elapsed after I parted from him on this occasion, 
before I met him again. I met him a few weeks ago 
(in August, 1869) at Eureka, Illinois. He is now in his 
seventy-fourth year, still wide-awake, and devoted to the 
interests of his beloved Master. 

Here resided also Arthur Chrifield, who became some- 
what famous as a poet, and the editor of the " Heretie 
Detector J^ He was a man of ability. A cloud of sad- 
ness, however, lowered over his patlnvay, from some 
cause unknown to me, for a time, during which he fra- 
ternized with the Episcopalians. The cloud passed away, 
and the light of the glorious gospel shone again about 
him. His sun of life set, as I have been informed, 
without an intervening cloud. Years ago he passed 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 69 

over the Jordan, and, no doubt, rests in Abraham's 
bosom, waiting in anticipation, with countless millions, 
the coming day, when the King of kings and the Lord 
of lords, who holds the keys of death and the unseen 
world, who shuts and no man can open, and opens and 
no man can shut, shall be seen coming in the clouds of 
heaven. 

Having preached for a time to the people of this 
vicinity, we next moved on towards '^ Shakertown,'' or 
Uniontown, as the Shakers called it, in "VVarren County. 
We arrived in that place near night-fall, and, seeing a 
man in the street, we inquired of him whether we could 
get lodging for the night. 

"Yes,'' replied, he, "we never turn strangers away.'' 

" Where shall we stop ? " we inquired. 

"It depends," said he, "on what your object is in 
wishing to stop with us. If you merely wish to stop 
over night, I would direct you to that house," pointing, 
as he spoke, to a large brick house, situate a few rods 
further along the same street on which we were travel- 
ing; "but," he continued, "if you wish to inquire as to 
our faith and order, you will stop at yon house," point- 
ing out another large brick building. 

"We are anxious," we said, "to learn all we can con- 
cerning your faith, doctrine, etc." 

" Well," said he, " go to that house, you will be enter- 
tained hospitably, and there you will get talk enough." 

We passed on to the last house pointed out by our 
courteous friend, where we were very kindly received ; 
and our horses being comfortably cared for, we w^ere 
shown into a clean, neat room, plainly furnished, to the 
right of the hall. Shortly after w^e were seated, two of 
their elders took seats with us, and a friendly and enter- 
taining conversation commenced, and was kept up until 



60 BE^nmSCEMJES AND INCIDENTS 

supper was announced; at which announcement feet were 
heard tripping on the floors above, do^yn the stairways, 
in the halls, and in every direction. We w^ere invited 
into the spacious hall, where we were directed to join the 
procession, which was marching in single file to the sup- 
per-table. We all filed into the dining-room and along 
the table to the right, with the w^all to our left, until I 
had made a little more than half the circuit of the spa- 
cious table. A halt was then ordered, we all faced about, 
and each had a plate knife and fork, w^ith food in abun- 
dance before him. Then, at a given signal, all knelt 
down for about a minute, but all w^ere mute. If thanks- 
giving and praise were rendered by any of us, it could 
only be knov/n to the Giver of all good gifts; there was 
not an audible word uttered. I freely confess that I de- 
pended upon those about me to render thanks in their 
own way. We arose, took our seats, and each one helped 
himself. Every variety of food which was on the table 
was so distributed, in suitable cups and dishes, that each 
one could help himself, Avithout depending upon others at 
all. There were about thirty of each sex at the table, the 
females being on one side and the males on the other. 
Silence reigned as profoundly as on the occasion of the 
burial of Sir John Moore. Supper being ended, the pro- 
cession was formed, and filed out of the room as we had 
come in, after which all dispersed and disappeared from 
our sight. 

We again took seats in the sitting-room, our company 
consisting of two Shaker preachers, my brother, and ray- 
self. We talked on religious subjects until about ten 
o'clock P. M. Our entertainers professed to be as pure as 
the angels of God, being children of the resurrection ; 
therefore they neither married nor were given in marriage. 
My brother most firmly and tenaciously controverted their 



IN TEE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 61 

doctrines, and denounced their dogmas, and finally de- 
clared that he had a notion to get married soon. 

" Well/^ said one of them, " if you are determined to 
be damned, go on. You are filled with an eternal fullness 
of your own ways, and must, of necessity, be damned.^' 

About ten o^clock P. M., a man rushed into our room, 
looking exceedingly fierce, as though he w^ere ready to 
cut himself with stones. He pulled off his coat, and or- 
dered my brother and me to take seats close up in a cor- 
ner of the room ; which we very readily and hurriedly did ; 
for I confess I was alarmed and a good deal agitated, 
not know^inar what mio^ht next ensue the wild demonstra- 
tion of the man who had so soon become minus his coat 
by his own voluntary election, and which might indicate 
the presence with him of some invisible demon. I was 
not long kept in suspense. A folding partition was moved 
to one side, and two large rooms became one ; the " mid- 
dle wall of partition ^^ not having been broken down, but 
shoved endwise. Pitty, pitty, trip, trip, feet were ht^ard 
hurrying from every part of the house into the spacious 
room. There were about sixty persons, thirty of each sex, 
and they arranged themselves in two single columns, with 
the males at one end and the females at the other of each 
column. In the middle of the two columns, where the 
men and women met in the lines, stood a very tall gentle- 
man, towering up above all, like Saul among the Israel- 
ites. He sang a ditty, and the rest all fell to dancing. 
They each faced the person in the opposite column, occa- 
sionally changing places by passing across and facing 
about. They kept, this up for a little time, say five or 
six minutes, w^hen the dance concluded, and evening wor- 
ship was over. All left the room but our preacher 
friends, who had so long entertained us with an account 
of their doctrine, .faith, order, etc. AVe were then shown 



62 BE3nNISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

to our sleeping apartment^ where we soon forgot all in the 
arms of Morpheus until morning. The same order to, 
at, and from the breakfast table was observed as at sup- 
per. The morning service was a repetition of the even- 
ing sacrifice. We remained until nine or ten o'clock 
A. M., ordered our horses, asked for our bill, learned that 
they would receive no pecuniary consideration for our en- 
tertainment, were cordially and affectionately invited to 
visit them as often as we could make it convenient, and 
with kind farewell we departed on our journey. 

Our Shaker friends urged us strongly to tarry with 
them over the next Lord's day. It was to be a high day 
with them, for, as they informed us, the devil was to be 
cast out of the meeting-house, bodily and visibly, so that 
outside spectators could see him, and have no misgivings 
thereafter in regard to his real existence and bodily form. 
We declined this pressing invitation, on the ground that 
if we tarried with them over Sunday, we should not be 
able to reach Cincinnati in time to be present at the open- 
ing of the discussion between Mr. Campbell and Mr. 
Owen. So we took our departure without having had the 
j^leasure of Avitnessing the exorcism of old Diabolus from 
the meeting-house of the Shakers of Union village, War- 
ren County, Ohio. The sight would have been interest- 
ing, no doubt. I was young then and inexperienced ; but 
I had the same firm conviction that I have now in regard 
to such things. I regard them as tricks of the shrewd 
and designing to deceive, for their own aggrandizement, 
the ignorant and simple; for it certainly requires a mind 
but little informed to be deceived by the idea that the 
devil is to be handled in the manner stated by these 
teachers and managers of the people of Shakertown. My 
own opinion then was, and still is, that there was more 
of the evil one in those men, invisible to the external eye, 



IN TEE LIFE OF A PIONEER PBEACHEE. 63 

than would ever be seen cast out of a meeting-house bod- 
ily. I had not then heard of Barnum, nor was he acting 
at that time on the theater of deception ; but there is trutli 
in his saying in regard to the gullability of mankind — 
"they like to be humbugged/^ 

But what a fearful account will those have to render 
before the Judge of all the earthy who have had good op- 
portunities to learn and know, and then prostitute their 
abilities to deceiving the weak and erring in the sacred 
name of the religion of the blessed Redeemer of sinners ! 
They in the resurrection state, indeed ! Surrounded by 
sin and temptation in every form, and themselves slaves 
to passion and carnality ! 

From this place we journeyed on to ^ew Baltimore; 
thence to Mount Pleasant, twelve miles north of Cincin- 
nati, where we held forth the word of life for a little time, 
during which we were very courteously entertained in the 
family of Brother Carnahan. Here we met sister Lane, 
mother of William Lane, an elder and preacher of the 
*^ Christian order/' At that time, I believe he was hold- 
ing forth in the State of New Jersey. One point with 
him was strenuously to oppose the doctrine of the "Trin- 
ity.'^ This, I believe, he considered of prime importance. 
The elder is still somewhere in the field of gospel labor, 
preaching the apostolic gospel, but somewhat fraternizing 
with the " Christian order,'' holding, as I have been in- 
formed, a seat in the conference of that denomination. I 
have often been where he had been before me, always 
hearing a good report of him, but never having the pleas- 
ure of meeting him so as to make his personal acquaint- 
ance. His mother was in tears, while she said she was 
much affected by the circumstance of seeing and hearing 
us, as we appeared to be so young and so far from home, 
pleading the cause of the Master. It brought vividly 



64 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

home to her the thought that her son, in his youth, was 
far from her, pleading the same glorious cause. 

Our next stage took us a little further south, and we 
stopped and preached nine miles north of Cincinnati. 
Here, I well remember, we became very bold in present- 
ing the ancient gospel, in contrast with the modern gospels. 
I endeavored to show, as clear as a sunbeam, that the 
gospel we r6-preached was an infallible one, while all mod- 
ern exhibitions in the name of the gospel of Christ were 
fallible. We proclaimed the apostolic gospel, which could 
not be other than infallible, because the apostles spoke 
as the Spirit gave them utterance. We insisted that those 
who resisted it, resisted the Holy Spirit; and finally that 
the ancient gospel was no less than the gospel of the Holy 
Spirit, of Christ and of God; and, being infallible, it was 
a fearful thing to resist it. By refusing to believe and 
obey it, we did resist it, and would be forever lost, be- 
cause God had no other plan of saving sinners. 

From this point we proceeded, without further stop, to 
the city of Cincinnati, to witness the contest between the 
Bishop of Buffalo, Virginia, and Mr. Owen, of Scotland — 
the former a Christian, the latter a Socialist. 

At the time appointed, the audience assembled to hear 
the discussion. An imposing Board of Moderators was 
posted on an elevated platform in front, a considerable 
distance from the speaker's stand, which was a pulpit. Judge 
Burnet was president of the board, which consisted of 
seven persons, if my memory serves me. I had heard 
and read of Mr. CampbelPs opponent for many months, 
and of course was anxious to see him and to view him 
from head to foot. I had read of his having intimidated 
the clergy of New Orleans, and, Goliath like, having defied 
the armies of the living God. 

The time arrived for the discussion to commence. The 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 65 

speakers were on hand, seated side by side on a sofa, in 
the pnlpit of a Methodist meeting-house on Sycamore 
Street, in the Queen City of the West. Mr. C. H. Sims 
was at his post, as stenographer — Mr. Gould, of Philadel- 
phia, with whom an arrangement had been made to report 
the discussion, having failed to come. 

There was a period of suppressed noise, and a reign of 
profound silence. All eyes were turned to the distin- 
guished speakers, and all ears ready to listen to their 
utterances. Mr. Owen was about six feet high, of courtly 
manners and very genteel port and bearing. He was 
dressed in an exceedingly neat and fine suit of black broad- 
cloth, had rather a classic face, and was, to appearance, 
considerably Mr. CampbelPs senior. Mr. Campbell was, 
at that time, about forty-one years old; foretop a little 
mixed with gray, was in robust health, and perhaps never 
made a better personal appearance. He was in stature 
about six feet. Ireland had given him an excellent phys- 
ical constitution, brain large and active, perceptive facul- 
ties large, causality full, and reflective organs good. 

At length silence was broken by Mr. Owen, who opened 
the discussion with the following sentence: '^It is neces- 
ary on my part to explain the cause of the present meet- 
ing." 

He then proceeded to give reasons, arising out of his 
experience, why he held the vie^vs which he was laboring 
to propagate. The most that was said by Mr. Owen, 
throughout the discussion, was read from carefully-pre- 
pared manuscript. His language was chaste English. 
Indeed, I regard it as rather a model. His utterances 
were quite deliberate. His manner indicated candor. 
His whole demeanor that of a dignified preacher, in a 
suit of black, declaring to sinners the gospel of salva- 
tion, rather than that of an unbeliever in the divine mis- 
6 



66 BE^IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

sion of Jesus of Nazareth, and the advocate of the ab- 
olition of marriage, private property, and district re- 
ligion — the trinity of evils of which he complained as 
" forming a chain of triple strength to hold the people in 
ignorance. ^^ He claimed that, by the power of the cir- 
cumstances by which he had been surrounded, he had dis- 
covered "twelve divine laws of human nature,'^ which, 
when carried into practice, would revolutionize society, 
and make men and women what they ought to be. These 
'^twelve laws of human nature,^^ when practically carried 
out, were to remodel human society, and overthrow all 
systems of religion, ancient and modern, Jewish, Pagan 
and Christian, which must all, of necessity, fall before 
the power of these twelve fundamental, divine laws of 
human nature. All that Mr. Owen said or read was 
predicated upon these twelve laws, which he read at the 
outset, endeavoring, by comments, to show how they 
would affect human society if carried out according to 
his philosophy of their practical working. Of course his 
social system, if admitted to be true, would show all 
religion to be false, because antagonistic to all systems 
of religion. 

The only difficulty about Mr. Owen's system is that we 
may admit the truth of his twelve laws, and yet his social 
system does not naturally follow. He could have or- 
ganized his system as well without the twelve laws as 
with them. Experiments have proved that Mr. Owen, 
and all others, are sadly in error and at fault when they 
ignore the Christian religion and organize society for 
social purposes on principles deduced from human reason, 
or any theory of humanity in which the principles of the 
Bible are repudiated. Christianity, having been vouch- 
safed to our race, it is as clear as the bright shining of 
the sun that true wisdom dictates the propriety of accept- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER FBEACHEB. 67 

ing it, and sound reason and good sense acknowledge its 
excellence and salutary influence in the government of 
the affections and passions of mankind. Alexander 
Campbell, on the occasion, produced a mass of evidence 
of such kinds and qualities as bid defiance to the suc- 
cessful opposition of atheists, deists, and slieptics of every 
school and caliber. His was, indeed, a masterly defense 
of our holy religion. A part of his first speech is, to my 
mind, one of the most eloquent efforts I ever listened to ; 
besides, it is an overwhelming argument in support of 
the proposition that CMirist and Christianity are what 
they claim to be — Divine. 

To those who are desirous of reading and studying the 
stroiigest arguments extant in favor of the Divine origin 
of both the Jewish and Christian religions, I would sug- 
gest the propriety of their procuring a copy of ^^ Camp- 
bell and Owen's Debate/^ which contains the speeches of 
the parties to the discussion we were attending. 

At Cincinnati, we met nearly one-half of all the preach- 
ers who were at this time advocating the "restoration of 
the ancient order of things,'' for such preachers were 
then like angels' visits, indeed, few ^nd far between. 
So anxious were the people to hear on the occasion of 
the discussion, that if the meeting-house had been three 
times as large as it was, it would have been filled to its 
utmost capacity. The house was quite commodious. 
Owen is now gone to his account — died, I believe, a 
spiritualist. After rejecting all rational evidence nearly 
all his life, he professed to believe witliout evidence, and 
so passed away. Campbell, too, is gone. His life was a 
constant illustration and demonstration of the excellence 
of that religion which he so ably defended. 

After the conclusion of the discussion, my brother and 
I separated — jhe taking charge of my horse, which was 



68 BEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

to be left at my father's, in Belmont County, Ohio — and, 
in company with John Taffe, he set out from Cincin- 
nati in a north-easterly direction. Brother Taffe was a 
preacher of the word, who had been immersed the pre- 
vious year by John Secrest, at a meeting held by him 
and myself at Antioch meeting-house, in Clinton County. 
At the time of his immersion, Brother Taffe was a law 
student, and soon after was admitted to practice in 
the courts of Fayette County, Ohio ; but preferring to 
preach the gospel of Christ to a continuance at the bar, 
he engaged in the former labor, and has been ever since 
an able proclaimer of the word of life. 

I took passage on board the steam-boat " Ben Frank- 
lin/' and, moving down the Ohio River, landed at Jef- 
ferson ville, in the State of Indiana; from which place 
I walked to Corydon, the old seat of government of 
Indiana, and which I reached some time in the after- 
noon, having taken breakfast in New Albany, and doing 
without dinner to the end of my twenty-five-mile walk. 
My intention was to study medicine with Dr. D. G. 
Mitchell, who was my father's youngest brother, and 
resided in Corydon. He had been married to Ann Jen- 
nings, a sister of Jonathan Jennings, formerly governor 
of the territory of Indiana, and lived in the house for- 
merly occupied by him. His wife and six children were 
dead, and but one child of all his family survived — my 
cousin, Ann Esther Maria — a young lady of sixteen. 

My uncle was very anxious to have me stay with him, 
and I thought I 'should; so, earnestly engaging in the 
study of medicine, I remained with him the balance of 
the spring and a part of the summer. He had been in 
the practice some twenty-two years, was rich, and having 
lost nearly all his family, he was quite desirous that I 
should stay with him, and he offered every inducement 



1 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 69 

that a fond relative, who possessed ample pecuniary 
means, could offer. But the ancient gospel had taken too 
strong a hold on my mind and affections for me to aban- 
don its proclamation for the healing art. There was, in 
all probability, money in the practice of medicine ; but 
no souls saved for my hire, no promises of shining as 
the stars for ever and ever, except to those who turn 
many to righteousness. There was a great conflict in my 
bosom during the time I remained at Corydon. On the 
one hand, there was presented to a young man the pros- 
pect of an honorable and lucrative profession — and I 
was poor in this world's goods ; on the other side, pov- 
erty, through toil and much tribulation, and a dependence 
upon the liberality of one here and there who would see 
and appreciate the necessity and privilege of assisting 
the poor way-worn preacher of the gospel, generally 
looked upon as a pauper, yet not entitled to receive the 
benefit of the pauper laws of any State. Insulted by 
such reflections as the following : " Too lazy to work, he 
thinks to make an easy living by preaching." ^' He is a 
stout looking fellow; let him work for his living as 
occasion offers." This I will do, I said to myself; and 
as long as God gives me physical strength, these hands 
shall minister to my necessities, and, if needs be, to 
those who are with me. The fearful corruption of Chris- 
tianity on the part of the Papists, and the immense dis- 
tance of those of Protestantdom, in their doctrines, 
creeds, and public teaching, from the teaching and prac- 
tice of the apostles, stared me in the face, as I beheld 
the multitudes perishing from lack of the knowledge of 
the simple truth as it is in Jesus, and so impressed me, 
that I determined to decline continuing with my uncle 
in the study of medicine, and I informed him of this 
determination. "Well," said he, "I am sorry that you 



70 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

have so concluded; I think you will be sorry for it; 
nevertheless, if you are determined to preach, I suppose 
you must attend to it, but if you will remain with me 
two weeks longer, I will give you a horse, saddle and 
bridle. You must wait until I get you a new saddle and 
bridle made ; the horse I have on hand/^ 

I accepted his kind offer, and, at the close of the two 
weeks, he furnished me with the things proposed, and a 
portmanteau in addition. The horse was as spotted as 
a leopard, and had been caught wild in Appaloosa. I 
mounted, and, turning my back upon Cor}^don, took up 
my journey eastward, since which time I have never seen 
my uncle nor the town in which he lived. 

I left Corydon about noon, and stopped, a little after 
•sun-down, about eight miles north of Louisville. This 
^vas comparatively a new settlement, and the road, for 
some time, not much traveled. I saw a sign nailed to a 
white-oak tree, about thirty feet from the ground, con- 
taining, in large letters, the announcement that there 
could be had " Enteetainment foe Man and Hoese." 
I dismounted and took lodging for the night. 

This was to me any thing but a pleasant night. The 
house was a low cabin, containing but two rooms — one 
in front and one back room with a shed roof. The in- 
mates were a man who was blind of one eye, and a not 
very prepossessing woman, whom I supposed to be his 
wife. From the time I stopped until bed-time, he en- 
tertained me by conversation relating to murders and 
other high crimes, which he said were of almost nightly 
occurrence, principally committed by negroes who came 
over from Kentucky. I think he enumerated as many 
as eight high crimes which had been committed within a 
week. Taking into consideration the personal appear- 
ance of this pair, the locality, the house and its sur- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 71 

roundings, it may well be supposed that my circum- 
stances at that time were pretty vicious, as Mr. Owen 
would have said. When my host deemed it late enough 
to retire, he stepped to the door, whistled, and brought 
into the house a large and savage-looking bull-dog. 
Setting the candle down, and pointing to the bed in 
which I was to sleep, "You will sleep there," said he; 
and, w^ith the admonition to blow out the candle when 
I retired, he and the woman withdrew to the back room, 
the bull-dog and I remaining in the front one. I blew 
out the light and laid down on the bed, which was 
within ten feet of the most traveled part of the road. I 
heard the dog turning round a few times on the bare 
floor, and then lying down with a heavy groan. I lay 
there and considered the circumstances by which I was 
then surrounded, and came to the conclusion that if the 
bull-dog was put there as a guard to protect the house 
against negroes and others, who might be disposed to 
evil, the bringing of him in was all right; but, as I was 
not consulted at all about having such a companion for 
the night, I did not know but the intention might be 
that I should be worried to death sometime in the night, 
which might easily have been done, for the dog was 
large and powerful. These thoughts did not induce 
sleep, and I slept none that night. At the dawn of 
day I arose, called the proprietor of the rude hotel, 
paid my bill, ordered my horse, and, as soon as possi- 
ble, took my departure. 

I wended my way toward Charlestown — the county 
seat of Clark County, Indiana — where I arrived before 
night-fall, and stopped at a public house. I informed the 
landlord that I was out preaching the ancient gospel, and 
would like to have an appointment made for me to 
preach in the court-house that night, which was ac- 



72 REIIINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

cordingly done. A small audience assembled to hear a 
strange preacher, and to them I preached the ancient 
gospel. 

It will be remembered that this was in 1829. In 1865, 
thirty-six years after this, I met a Brother and Sister 
Teeples in Laporte, Ind. After an introduction by Sis- 
ter Lord, wife of Elder Lord, who was preaching in La- 
porte at that time. Brother Teeples said : 

^^You are the first man I ever heard preach the gospeV 

"Are you not mistaken ?^^ said I; "I think you and I 
never met before. '' 

"I heard you preach the first gospel sermon I ever 
heard,^' said Brother T. " Did you not preach in the 
court-house at Charlestown, in this State ?^' 

" I preached there once,^' said I, " now more than 
thirty years ago.^^ 

"That's the time I heard you,'' said Brother Teeples, 
" and my wife and I never got over that discourse until 
we both became disciples of Christ.'' 

When he made that remark, I thought of the words 
of the Saviour, "As you go, preach." Little did I hope 
that I had accomplished any thing of importance by that 
single discourse. This teaches us that preachers should 
preach the word, and that Paul meant something when 
he said to Timothy "Be instant in season and out of 
season." 

From Charlestown I went on to a place called Centre- 
ville, and stopped with a brother of the Christian order, 
named Ford. I delivered one discourse in a small 
school-house in this place, and next morning took my 
departure towards Washington County, Pennsylvania. 
Nothing of note occurred, only whenever and wherever 
I could find or make opportunity to preach I did so, 
whether my hearers were few or many, and felt .just as 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 73 

much solicitude for the salvation of souls when my 
audience was small as when it was large. Suffice it to say 
here, that I reached Washington in safety, having trav- 
eled from Corydon about six hundred miles, on horseback 
and alone, preaching at every opportunity along the Avay, 
and always making it a point to seek opportunities. We 
did not, in those days, wait for some one to write and 
insist on our coming to his place, to hold a meeting, 
with the understanding that we should receive satisfac- 
tory compensation in good and current coin of the coun- 
try. A pioneer was terribly in earnest. Souls were to 
be saved from the guilt of sin here, and from the punish- 
ment of sin hereafter, or else be eternally damned. It 
was understood by him, too, that as formerly, so now, 
^Mt pleased God through the foolishness of preaching to 
save them that believe,'' and not through the belief of 
foolish preaching. For what preacher of the ancient 
gospel, knowing and appreciating it, and being sensible 
of the wide diff'erence between it and the exhibitions of 
the modern gospels of the various denominations, (which 
are just what Brother Campbell said they were, in his 
notable sermon at Redstone in 1816, ^^A compound of 
Judaism, Heathenism and Christianity,'') does not feel 
like Jeremiah of old, when the word of the Lord was 
like fire shut up in his bones? 

I spent the year 1830 in traveling in various parts of 
Ohio, western Pennsylvania, and some in western Vir- 
ginia. I preached in Belmont, Monroe, Guernsey, Mus- 
kingum, Morgan, AYashington, Tuscarawas, Holmes, 
Wayne, Stark, Columbiana, Harrison and some other 
counties in Ohio ; in Ohio County, Virginia ; and in 
Washington, Beaver and Green, in Pennsylvania. 

This year I was ordained by the laying on of the 
hands of three preachers. I do not know whether they 
7 



74 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

fasted or not; but I know they prayed fervently. The 
preachers who attended to this ceremony w^ere John Se- 
crest, formerly of the Christian order, David Burnet, 
formerly a Baptist preacher, and William Jarvis, formerly 
a Methodist preacher. It will be seen, therefore, that my 
ordination was legitimate, descending, through the Pres- 
byterian line, down to B. W. Stone, then to John Secrest; 
from Brother Burnet back through a long line of Bap- 
tist elders, until lost in remote antiquity ; then from 
Brother Jarvis back to the great and good John Wesley; 
and from him, merging in the ecclesiasticism of the im- 
posing Church of England, back to the time of King 
Henry VIII., who, with his bishops, were legitimate rep- 
resentatives of the Eoman Catholic Church, the mistress 
of the world, whose lordly ministry claimed and held 
precedence to all earthly kings and secular potentates, 
and whose feet had trodden upon the necks of sovereigns. 
Having been thus ordained, I felt no better qualified 
to preach the word and call on sinners to flee from the 
wrath to come than I did before. But then I was 
legally entitled to receive license from the court of the 
county in which I officiated and claimed to be domiciled, 
to solemnize marriage contracts between loving couples, 
w^ho might notify me that they desired my professional 
services as a clergyman; for be it known, that no 
preacher but a regularly ordained one had the legal right 
to solemnize the contract of holy matrimony within the 
bounds of the State of Ohio ; and this license continued 
in force only while the minister was in good standing in 
the church to which he belonged. Th^ certificate upon 
which I obtained license from the court of Belmont 
County, Ohio, set forth that I was an acceptable preacher 
in the church of God. I was greatly indebted to old 
Brother Ring, of Captina Creek, for his influence in 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 75 

procuring this license, at the January term of court, 
A. D. 1830. But for his assistance, I think I would 
scarcely have been able to obtain it, for there was great 
prejudice existing against those heretical preachers, then 
"generally denominated " Campbellites.'^ 

On one occasion during this year, I preached on Sandy 
Creek, some eight or nine miles above Minerva, in Stark 
Co., Ohio. I gave an invitation, to which a woman re- 
sponded, and I baptized her on the same day, which w^as 
the Lord's day. I left an appointment at the place for 
the following Thursday evening, came back at the ap- 
pointed time, and opened the services as usual. Soon 
after I began to speak, I observed in the crowd a man 
who was weeping, and who continued to weep until I 
concluded with an invitation to sinners, when he promptly 
came forward and gave me his hand, as an indication that 
he desired to obey. I immersed him the same hour of 
the night. ISText morning, in compliance with his urgent 
solicitation, I called to see him at his own house. I 
never saw a man happier, or one that appeared to rejoice 
more at his release from sin and from bondage to Satan. 
He told me that on Monday morning, after the evening 
of the immersion of his wife, he took his rifle and 
watched the road for hours where he thought I would 
pass that forenoon. He knew where I lodged over night, 
and watched with the full and deliberate intention of 
shooting me for having immersed his wife. 

This man was named Bear. If still living, he will 
bear witness to the truth of these facts. He told me that 
he believed the devil had so strong a hold of him that 
morning, that he would have shot at me with deliberate 
intent to kill me, if I had come within his range. 

During this year I preached considerably on Killbuck 
Creek, in the Morgan and Lockhart neighborhood, some 



76 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

twelve or fifteen miles south of Wooster. Here I im- 
mersed a number of persons for the remission of sins; and 
among the number William Grant Lowe, who weighed two 
hundred and twenty pounds at the age of twenty-one 
years. He married Temperance Morgan. I staid with 
them over night in 1836, and have neither seen nor heard 
of them since. 

I also preached several times this year in Wheeling, 
"Va. On one evening after preaching, I gave an invita- 
tion for obedience, when a lady responded, and desired to 
be immersed that same night. Before we left the house, 
one of the brethren said to me : " This same lady came 
forward once to be immersed by Brother Campbell, and 
he would not immerse her because she told him she did 
not wish to be immersed for the remission of siiis ; that 
they had been remitted years before ; that she was as free 
from sin as a sheet of^vhite paper was from blots." 
" Well,'' said Brother Campbell ; " you do not need to be 
baptized, you are not a fit subject for baptism.'' So he did 
not baptize her. 

"Now," said Brother Encel or Brother Battenfield, I 
do not remember which, " what are you going to do if you 
are told by her the same thing which she told Brother 
Campbell?" 

I replied : " There is no danger of her telling me that,'^ 
and so we Avent to the Ohio Eiver. On shore I offered 
prayer, took her confession, and asked her if, in pursu- 
ance of said confession, she desired to be immersed. She 
responded in the affirmative. I then asked her what she 
wanted to be baptized for. " For the remission of sins," 
said she, very promptly, and without equivocation. We 
went down into the water, I immersed her, and she man- 
ifested much gladness and joy in her obedience to the 
great Head of the Church. This lady's name was For- 



IN TEE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 77 

dice. I left an appointment to preach again in AVheeling 
in two weeks. 

At the appointed time, I was there. Brother Batten- 
field said to me: "Brother Mitchell, you must be careful 
how you walk the streets of Wheeling ; that man whose 
wife you immersed when you were here last, has threat- 
ened to horsewhip you if he ever meets you in Wheel- 
ing.^' 

" Brother Battenfield,'' said I, " do you think he would 
carry his threat into execution ? What sort of man is he ? '' 

" I would not put it past him,'' replied Brother B. 
" Fordice is a pretty rough and passionate man." 

'^Then," said I, ^^will you go with me to his house 
that I may see him — get the horsewhipping, and have it 
over, that I may not be in fearful suspense while walking 
the streets, for I want to stay here a number of days." 

" Are you in earnest ? " inquired he. 

" Certainly," responded I. 

" Then," said he, " I will go with you." 

We went, accordingly, saw Mr. Fordice, had an intro- 
duction to him, passed the usual compliments with him 
as he stood in front of his house, and then went into the 
house, where we called on Sister Fordice and their son; 
came out and conversed a little more with Mr. F., who 
was mixing lime and sand for plastering, and said fare- 
well. 

After I left, some persons who had heard his threats 
undertook to tease him for not carrying them into execu- 
tion. He was not present at the baptism, and therefore 
had not seen me until I called on him, as stated. His re- 
ply to this raillery Avas : " I did not know that he was the 
man who baptized my wife; I thought that it was that 
devil of a Bennett. Mitchell may baptize her as often as 
he pleases." 



78 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

I believe it was in this year that my elder brother and 
I went on a preaching tour up to Ten-mile Creek, where 
we held forth in several places, especially at Slush er's 
Mills, after which we came down through Green County, 
Pa., preaching wherever we could get opportunities; 
crossed the line between Virginia and Pennsylvania, went 
through the '^ Panhandle,^^ and finally reached AYells- 
burgh, on the Ohio River. Here we stopped with old 
Father Brown, the father of Alexander Campbell^s first 
wife, Avho was residing in a brick house in that town. He 
received us courteously, and related to us many things of 
interest. 

Once he asked us what we thought of the reformation; 
"is it not a sort of Babel building ?^^ asked he. We told 
him we thought it was all right to restore primitive 
Christianity to the people ; that the popular exhibitions 
of the gospel were far from being what they ought to be. 

"What do you think of Alexander Campbell "?^^ he in- 
quired. We replied that we thought well of him ; that 
with his tongue and pen he was doing a great work. 

" Xow,'^ said he, " let me tell you about him. He used 
to travel on foot and preach the gospel, not being able to 
own a horse. He went plainly clad, his suit generally 
being Kentucky jeans. I lived at that time on Buffalo 
Creek, where Alexander now lives. He came there fre- 
quently, and he and our only child — a daughter named 
Margaret — were in the habit of holding private conversa- 
tions. I observed to the old lady one day that I believed 
Margaret had formed a warm attachment for Alexander ; 
now what if it should so happen that he and she should 
want to get married, what would you think of Margaret's 
choice? The old lady scarcely knew Avhat to say, and 
asked me what I thought about it. I. replied that Alex- 
ander was poor in this world's goods, but,'' said I, "he has 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 79 

sometliing that is a great deal better. He is pious, has a 
fine education, is talented, and will some day make his 
mark. Sure enough, he ask^d for Margaret in marriage, 
and we gave our consent Shortly after their marriage, 
we came to this place, where I own two brick houses, this 
one and another. We left them to take the homestead, 
and make the best they could out of the property. I left 
homestead, out-buildings, farm, stock, and mill, all with 
them, and even the household furniture. They are mak- 
ing good use of the premises, and are doing well." 

Such is substantially the history the old gentleman gave 
of this matter. It was interesting to us at the time, and 
has often been called up in memory during the great and 
eventful life of that great and good man to whom it re- 
lated. 

This same 3'ear I was preaching south of Wooster, 
some ten or twelve miles, where I was introduced to a 
Brother George Sharp, who, as he told me, had formerly 
resided in Washington County, Pa., where he had been 
well acquainted with Thomas and Alexander Campbell, 
and was present when the latter delivered his first dis- 
course. After the services, on this occasion, he said the 
people got together here and there in groups, and were 
all talking of the admirable discourse of the young man. 
Some said, '^ It is wonderful ! " others said, " He will soon 
far excel his father;" and all agreed in their admiration 
of the ability displayed by the speaker on the occasion. 
Brother Sharp also related to me the following anecdote 
of Father Thomas Campbell. Said he : " Thomas Camp- 
bell once came to my house, and after the usual greet- 
ings, he said to me, ' Your name is George and mine is 
Thomas ; I will call you by your name of George, and 
you call me Thomas, and let us have a religious conver- 
sation.^ Then he began : ^ George, how do you read the 



80 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

Scriptures?^ I replied that I endeavored to read them 
prayerfully and reverently, as the word of God. ^But, 
George/ said he, ' do you read the Scriptures with due 
regard to the design of each particular book of the Bible, 
especially with regard to the books of the Xew Testa- 
ment scriptures?^ I replied that I did not know that I 
did ; that I regarded the whole Bible as the word of God, 
and that it mattered very little to me where I read, so 
that I read in the Bible. Brother Campbell then com- 
menced to tell me how to read the Scriptures, and pro- 
ceeded to state the design of each book of the New Tes- 
tament, in their order. He talked to me for hours, and 
imparted to me more information, and afforded me more 
light than I had ever obtained from all the catechisms 
and sermons I had ever read or heard before. It opened 
a new field to my mind, and commenced a new era in my 
life." 

This year (1830) my brother, James Gibson Mitchell, 
with whom I had traveled so many miles. Elder George 
Lucy, a powerful and successful preacher of the ancient 
gospel, and I went from eastern Ohio to Meigs County, 
where my brother was married to Miss Sophia Wil- 
liams, daughter of Benjamin and Electa AYilliams — 
Brother Lucy performing the marriage ceremony. 

Suffice it to say that throughout this year, I was con- 
stantly on the go. Here, and there, and yonder, wherever 
the Avay opened for a hearing on the glorious theme of 
human redemption through the Saviour Jesus,, our 
Lord and Eedeemer. Through heat and cold, driving 
winds, snow and storm, rain, sleet and mud, no day too 
severe to go and meet an appointment. 

I remember that on one occasion my brother and I 
went to meet an appointment in what was called Spill- 
mau^s School-house, in northern Meigs County, Ohio. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 81 

The house was pretty Avell crowded. We took seats near 
the door, while the people still continued to come in. 
Now a very tall man came, stooped in at the door, and 
raising himself to an erect position, his head nearly 
reached the joists. He was, as we learned afterward, six 
feet and a half in his stockings. Immediately following 
him came another of like stature, who bowed himself 
into the house and erected himself by the side of the 
other (for the seats were all filled). Then a third man 
made his appearance, and stooping as those who preceded 
him had done, he effected an entrance, and posting him- 
self beside them, there the three stood, a sight well worth 
seeing. The last one, we learned afterward, was seven 
inches above six feet high. 

Brother James turned his head slightly in the direction 
of the trio, surveyed them from head to foot and from 
feet to head, and turning to me, whispered softly: 
'^Brother Nathan, we are in the land of the Anakims; 
there are mighty giants here ; we are nothing but grass- 
hoppers in their sight.^^ I replied, '^ If the Lord delight 
in us, we are fully able to possess this land.'^ 

It was certainly somewhat remarkable that three men 
so unusually tall as they should reside in one vicinity, 
still more remarkable that they should all three come to 
that meeting, and most remarkable that the three should 
follow each other so closely into the house, and that the 
situation of affairs required them to stand together. But 
so it was. I never witnessed the like before, nor have I 
since. 

I may as well, in this connection, remark, that none 
but a pioneer'" has an adequate idea of the bitterness and 
virulence with which sectarian clergymen first, laymen next, 
and laytcomen thirdly, opposed the apostolic gospel. All 
sorts of slander, misrepresentation and downright false- 



82 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

hood were propagated against those who were publicly- 
advocating the 7'estoration of primitive Christianity, Noth- 
ing was too hard to be said, no slander too vile. One 
misrepresentation that prevailed wherever any of the 
brethren introduced the cause, was : '' These people teach 
the horrible heresy that if you are only baptized all is 
well; you will go to heaven in spite of the devil and 
every one else. Water! water! is their cry; they are 
water dabblers. They deny the blood of the Saviour, 
and substitute water in the room thereof." Such like, 
and many of them, were the slanders propagated by those 
who professed to be Christians. It seemed almost im- 
possible to convince the people, where these slanders had 
gone before, that the Campbellites did not teach the senti- 
ment that baptism alone would save from sin here and 
hell hereafter. 

I was in Athens County, Ohio, and went to a schodl- 
house to preach. I was met by a gentleman at the door, 
who called me to one side, wishing to speak a little with 
me before preaching. Said he: ^^It is reported in this 
neighborhood that you folks teach and preach that if a 
person says he believes that Jesus Christ is the Son of 
God, and is immersed, that he is then sure of heaven. 
Is this, true ? I wish you would speak on baptism to- 
day, and let us know what your views are." This man 
was a Methodist class-leader. 

That day I preached from Acts ii. 38. I first showed 
the necessity of faith as the ^principle of actiou in conver- 
sion or turning to God. Secondly, that repentance was 
essential to salvation, or the remission of sins; and 
thirdly, that baptism followed faith and repentance, and 
Avas also essential to remission of sins; that faith, re- 
pentance and baptism were three steps leading to a cer- 
tain point, that all were necessary, and that each occupied 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PBEACHEB. 83 

its own place in the process of turning to God; that one 
item could not take the place or occupy the position of 
another; that the second step could not be taken before 
the first, nor the third before the second. Thus I labored 
and elaborated the matter to prolixity, for we thought 
nothing then of preaching two hours, or two hours and 
half at a time. 

After meeting, our class-leader came to me and re- 
marked in substance as follows : " Well, sir, if I under- 
stood you, you teach that all that is necessary in order 
to the remission of sins is to be baptized,'^ 

" Did you so understand me ? ^' I inquired. 

" Yes, sir," said he, " I so understood you to-day." 

^^Then, sir," replied I, ^^I despair of having you un- 
derstand the plainest statements. If I did not refute 
that slander, it can not be refuted." 

One man reported that he saw my brother James im- 
merse a drunken man in Sunday Creek ; that when he 
took him out of the water, he simply hauled him upon 
the beach, remarking, "Lie there, my brother; you are so 
drunk that perhaps you will not receive the Holy Ghost 
for two or three days." 

The same kind of fellow would sometimes draw the 
likeness of a man on a board, with a piece of charcoal or 
chalk, set the board by the road-side, perforate the image 
with rifle-balls, and write below it Elder Mitchell or 
Elder Lucy. No doubt this demoniac was encouraged 
by those making loud professions of religion, and often 
bawling at the top of their voices, " Give us Holy Ghost 
religion ! " " Lord, baptize us with fire and the Holy 
Ghost ! " This same man reported that he had been 
over to Federal Creek, and heard a man named " Sea- 
cat," (meaning Elder John Secrest,) preaching ; and that 
he had discovered a new route to heaven, said to be 



84 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

sixty miles nigher than the old road, and all the way 
by water. 

Such is a specimen of the low, vulgar and miserable 
slander propagated by wicked men against the disciples, 
and winked at, if not openly encouraged, by the orthodox 
professors of the religion of the blessed Redeemer. 

Those were the days when no coward or faint-hearted 
preacher had any business with the advocacy of the cause 
of primitive Christianity. It required men of faith and 
undoubted physical and moral courage, whose purpose 
was to win souls and not filthy lucer, and whose desire 
was to advocate the pure truth of God from the pure love 
of it. No mere moral lectures, or refined and intangible 
metaphysics would answer to the end in view. A war 
of extermination against human creeds and confessions 
of opinion had to be waged by the advocates of restor- 
ation. The abominations of Roman Catholicism, as well 
as the doubtful and doubting systems of Protestantism, 
were to be exposed and opposed. The eifort was neces- 
sarily aggressive. He who volunteered to advocate the 
cause, well knew that his position was not one of inglo- 
rious ease. He was fully aware that there was no place 
for mere sinecures. It meant work, hard work, and re- 
quired much self-denial and the sacrifice of all earthly 
honors, wealth and considerations. There was no place, 
in those days, in this field, for the gentleman with kid 
gloves, and heavy gold watch seals and chains. The cry 
was, for the love of God and of perishing humanity, for 
the love of truth and deprecation of error and wicked- 
ness, for the hope of heaven and a crown of unfading 
glory, lay off every thing that will impede the work; turn 
neither to the right hand nor to the left, but labor in 
earnest. Straightforward in the truth! now is the time! 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 85 

now it is day ! the night cometh " wherein no man can 
work.'' 

And now we dismiss the year 1830. How much good 
I did through the Divine favor, is recorded on high and 
not below. I know not, nor shall I until the day of 
eternity, what were the fruits of my labors, which were 
spread over so extensive a field. How many I immersed 
I can not say. I know that I conscientiously endeavored 
to do my whole duty in the sight of God and of men. 
I am consoled with the thought that many in the day of 
eternity will bless God that they sat under my voice, and 
heard the ancient gospel in contrast with the modern ex- 
hibitions of it. 



86 EE^IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 



CHAPTEK lY. 

Tour tlirongli the Nortli-west in company with John Secrest — An en- 
counter with Mormon Elders, etc. — Eeturn to Ohio — Meeting at 
New Lisbon — Thomas and Alexander Campbell and Walter Scott 
there. 

In the spring of 1831^ I started from Belmont County, 
Ohio, in company with Elder John Secrest, to go on a 
tour to Illinois, via north-western Ohio, southern Michi- 
gan and northern Indiana. We passed out of Belmont 
into Harrison County, thence into Columbiana, and on 
into Minerva, in Stark County, preaching the word in 
numerous places as we passed along. 

At Minerva, lived Elder John Whitacre, as noble a 
spirit as was to be found anywhere. A man of large 
heart and large brain, an eloquent and fervent preacher 
of the ancient gospel, and an eminently successful advo- 
cate of the cause of primitive Christianity, — many, no 
doubt, wdll bless God in eternity that they were per- 
mitted to hear his powerful appeals to sinners to obey 
the Saviour and escape the vengeance of the dreadful day 
of fiery indignation. His house was a home for every 
body, and especially was it the asylum of the poor 
weary preacher, where he might rest for a season, and 
recruit for a new onset. He could not fail to feel 
at home while in the society of this remarkable man. 
Goodness and kindness were plainly depicted in his 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PBEACHER. 87 

handsome face, and his eyes were the exponents of pure 
benignity. I think he was unrivaled in all the elements 
that constitute the useful and the good. The Lord 
blessed him with considerable of this world's goods, and 
he used them as the steward of the Lord, and not as 
though he or his goods were his own. 

From Minerva, we passed on through Canton, Mas- 
sillon, Wooster and Jeromeville, not stopping long any- 
where until we reached Oliver Jones's, five miles north 
of Bucyrus, and near Whetstone Creek. Here we wore 
gladly received and courteously entertained. Brother 
Oliver Jones was the uncle of our excellent preaching 
brother J. Harrison Jones, son of Isaiah Jones, who at 
that time resided at Jeromeville, in Wayne County, now, 
I believe, in Ashland County, Ohio. Here we remained 
several days, preaching the word, and a number w^ere 
obedient to the faith. In 1860, I met Elder Van Yoor- 
ish. Said he, "Well done good and faithful servant, 
I heard brother Mitchell preach when I was a boy.'' 
Bro. V. was quite gray -headed, and his beard nearly 
white. 

When I had an opportunity, I asked him where he 
heard me preach when he was a boy. " At Oliver Jones's, 
on Whetstone Creek," he replied. " I remember your 
text yet: ^ O, foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, 
that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes 
Jesus Christ hath been crucified, evidently set forth 
among you ? ' " 

From this neighborhood, we journeyed on, through 
upper Sandusky and Fort Fin lay. Some distance below 
the latter place, on the Blanchard's fork of the Auglaize 
River, we encamped for the night, and built four or five 
gnat fires, to keep the musquitoes and gnats from so greatly 
annoying ourselves and our horses as they would otherwise 



88 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

have done. We tied one horse to a sapling, and left the 
other loose, to graze on the luxuriant pea-vine, which 
grew in great abundance in that locality. We laid down 
by the root of a large tree, with saddle-bags for pillows 
and the oanopy of heaven for our covering. Nothing so 
much disturbed the profound silence of these solemn old 
woods as the clambering of porcupines around us and on 
the trees above us. They kept up a continuous squealing 
and clattering through the night; but my colleague was 
soon fast in the arms of Morpheus, and seemed to enjoy 
himself hugely. Next morning, at the peep of dawn, we 
were again in our saddles, and wending our w^ay through 
the forest. After riding about half an hour, we passed 
through a village. The buildings were wigwams, the in- 
habitants Tawee Indians. They looked coyly at us and 
we curiously at them, as people of different races, neither 
party, however, saying any thing to the other. At night 
we again lay in the " deep-tangled wildwood '' on the 
Auglaize, whose sluggish waters, in many places covered 
with a green scum, presented any thing but a healthy ap- 
pearance. My companion in travel was a Kentuckian by 
birth and education, and had conceived an unfavorable 
opinion of all Yankees. He would say there w^ere none 
of them honest. I w^ould join issue with him, and we 
had many a long dispute on the question. While he 
eulogized Kentuckians and Virginians, I advocated the 
cause of all, alleging that there were good and bad men 
among all peoples. ^^Not an honest Yankee," he would 
say ; '^ no, not one ! " 

Pretty late in the morning, after our last night in the 
woods, we came to Fort Defiance. At the river, back of 
town, stood a little frame dwelling house. We inquired 
of a gentleman there w4iether there were facilities for our 
crossing the Maumee. ^^Yes,'^ he responded, ^^you can 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 89 

take your saddle-bags in a skiff tliat I keep here, and 
swim your horses along-side.^' In this way he got us 
safely over, and charged us fifty cents only apiece for 
the accommodation. My companion said that he had no 
doubt this man was a Virginian ^r Kentuckian; "had he 
been a Yankee/' said he, "he would have charged us a 
dollar apiece.'' 

We stopped two miles west of Defiance at a ]Mr. Per- 
kins' and asked him whether our accommodating friend 
was a Virginian or Kentuckian. We got him to under- 
stand whom we meant by describing his locality. He 
informed us that the man Avas a Virginian. " I told you 
so," said my companion, triumphantly. " Why do you 
inquire where he came from?" inquired Mr. Perkins. 
When we answered his question, he laughed immoder- 
ately, and said " why, he took you across a deep hole in 
the river, and you were oif the road. A little above 
where you crossed, and on the main road, there is a ford 
where the water is not belly deep to your horses." 

I relate this circumstance to show two things : First, 
that some men will do a very mean thing for a small 
consideration ; and, secondly, prejudice, from education, 
will greatly blind and mislead a person. Xever before 
did my friend believe that a Kentuckian or Virginian 
could be capable of so small a meanness. We took 
breakfast with Mr. Perkins, and again entered into the 
wilderness. In the afternoon we stopped at a French 
trading establishment, on the Little St. Joseph's Eiver, 
and put up for the night. Sometime after our arrival, 
there came several men with teams and wagons laden 
with grain. I inquired of one of them where he resided. 
He told me fifty-two miles farther west, at the first house. 
"I live," isaid he, "'in the first house west from here, 
on the east side of Mongoquenon prairie." The next 
8 



90 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

evening we arrived in that prairie about eight o'clock 
P. M., satisfied that the distance had not been over- 
estimated. The men with the grain had twenty-five 
miles further to go to reach the nearest mill ; making 
in all seventy-seven miles from Mongoquenon prairie. 
This mill was on Bean River, two or three miles Avest of 
Fort Defiance. 

Elder Secrest and I preached to the people at the 
following places : Mongoquenon prairie, White Pigeon, 
Beardsley's, Young's, Big Prairie Round, Little Prairie 
Round, Notaway Sepee and Pocagon prairie, and at Mott- 
ville and Elkhart prairie. In all of these places, we 
sowed bountifully the good seed of the kingdom. We 
had very attentive hearers and good success, as witness 
the hearty surrender of a number of precious souls to the 
obedience of the faith. Brother William Garwood, who 
resided at and owned twelve hundred acres of land in 
Pocagon prairie, all in one body, offered me eighty acres, 
to be selected by myself, if I would remain in the country 
and preach the gospel in the region round about. His 
kind offer was declined, because lands were no tempta- 
tion to me. 

We left southern Michigan from the town of Niles, 
and passed for many miles along an Indian trail ; pass- 
ing through the Door prairie, we stopped at a place called 
New Durham prairie. To this place, by request of a 
gentleman who sometime previously had met us at Poca- 
gon, we had sent an appointment. Arriving at the hour, 
we found the people gathered together at the house of 
a Mr. Ayehart. Soon after w^e went in, w^e commenced 
and sang through a familiar hymn. This being done, a 
gentleman rose and said : ^^ Let us pray,'' and kneeling 
down, the audience follow^ed his example. After prayer 
he again said: "We are not singers ourselves, will our 



I 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 91 

friends have the goodness to sing again ?^' We were not 
aware of the meaning of this procedure, but calmly 
awaiting the development, we sang another hymn ; im- 
mediately after which the same gentleman arose and read 
the promise to Abraham, Genesis xii. He then preached 
an excellent discourse, tracing the promise down the 
stream of time to the full blaze of the gospel dispensa- 
tion, as recorded in the second chapter of the Acts of 
the Apostles; and closed by an allusion to another bible 
which had recently come to light, and gave way for a 
man who was with him to introduce and enforce the 
book of Mormon. Then our Mormon preacher gave us 
a discourse of about an hour, and was followed by my 
companion in travel, who delivered a short exhortation, 
closing with the request that his comrade be allowed the 
privilege of speaking. The Mormon preacher looked at 
me and asked if I desired to say any thing. I answered 
that I did ; that I was desirous of opposing the book of 
Mormon. " Well,^^ said he; "we do not wish to have 
any controversy, and presume the audience do not wish 
to hear any.'^ 

" Then,'' said I, " you may as well dismiss the congre- 
gation, if you are through ; because, if I speak, it will 
be in opposition to the book of Mormon, as I esteem it 
an imposture of the worst kind." He then dismissed 
the audience, whereupon I arose and called for the atten- 
tion of the people for a short period. All the people 
sat down and were ready to hear, and I proceeded to 
offer the following arguments in support of the propo- 
sition that the book of Mormon was not a revelation 
from God, but an imposture. 

Fh^st. — The book of Mormon states that Nephi, a 
descendant of the patriarch Joseph, came over the ocean 
in a craft as long as a tree ; and that this country became 



92 BEMimSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

populated by his descendants. The book then states that 
they worshiped God about as the Jews were directed to 
worship ; that there were many priests who offered sacri- 
fices according to the teachings of the law. The objec- 
tion is that no one was permitted to officiate as a priest 
except those of the tribe of Levi^ and these were of the 
tribe of Joseph. 

Second. — The golden plates^ of which the book of Mor- 
mon, as shown here, is a translation, were hid in the 
ground twelve hundred years before they were exhumed 
by Joseph Smith. The white inhabitants who are on 
this continent either came from the eastern continent 
themselves, or are the descendants of those who did come 
since 1492 — the date of the discovery of America by 
Christopher Columbus. These facts, in connection with 
the facts set out in the book of Mormon — that the rec- 
ords pertained to the seed of Nephi, the last of whom 
lived and kept a record, and died more than twelve hun- 
dred years ago, prove that the book of Mormon does not 
belong to the white inhabitants of this continent. 

Thh'd. — It is affirmed that Joseph Smith is ignorant, 
and could not have made a translation from the plates, 
except under the guidance of the Spirit. Now, admitting 
this statement to be true, and the conclusion follows that 
the book of Mormon is not divine; because, whatever 
spirit influenced and guided Smith, it is clear that it was 
the spirit of a Yankee, as the work abounds with New 
England provincialisms. 

Fourth. — The book contains the affidavit of twelve men, 
as follows: " We, whose names are hereunto subscribed, do 
certify that so many of the golden plates as the said Joseph 
Smith did translate, loe saw icith our eyes, and did heft with 
our hands. Before God, loc lie oiot.'' 

"Now,^^ said I, *^ observe the word heft.^' (We should 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 93 

here note that the word heft was purely a Yankee pro- 
vincialism). Then observe the guarded phraseology of 
the certificate, ^ That so many of the golden plates as the 
said Joseph Smith did translate, etc' Who could not 
truthfully subscribe the certificate and make the affidavit ? 
I should have no hesitancy in doing so; just as many of 
the plates as he translated just so many I saw and did 
heft; that is to say, not one. 

By this time the Yankee Mormon preacher was consid- 
erably excited. There was quite a flush on his face, and 
he requested me, if I pleased, to bring some plausible ob- 
jection to the book. I remarked that if the objections 
already brought were not plausible, he should have a 
chance to show that they were not. He replied that 
when he was first called on to accept the book of Mor- 
mon as a revelation from God, that he was quite as much 
opposed to it as I was. '^ I was told,'' said he, ^' to pray 
to God to know whether the book was a revelation from 
him or not; I did so pray, and God did reveal to me 
that it was true and divine ; and I advise you to do like- 
wise, for I perceive that you are a pretty hot-headed 
young man." 

'^ In what language did God speak to you?" I in- 
quired. 

^^He did not speak to me at all," he replied; ^^but in 
answer to prayer, I received an impression that the book 
was true." 

Said I : ^^ You said God revealed to you that it was true. 
Kow you say it was an impression, therefore not a revela- 
tion. Now, one thing more. How do you know this 
impression was not made by the devil? I knoAV, sir, that 
the devil made the impression, because the book of Mor- 
mon contradicts the Bible, and none but an evil spirit 
would produce such an impression." 



94 MEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

By this time the Mormon started for the door, and one 
man followed him. I made a few further remarks, and 
the audience were again dismissed, and this time dis- 
persed. I gave out preaching for the next day, continued 
the meeting for several days, and immersed a number of 
persons for the remission of sins, on a confession of their 
faith in the Son of God. 

During this meeting, I made my home with Mr. Aye- 
heart. Mrs. Ayeheart's mother was for many years a 
prisoner among the Indians, having been carried away 
captive from West Virginia. She was permitted to select 
a white husband from among the captives or marry an 
Indian. She chose the former, and was married accord- 
ing to the marriage rites of the tribe. Sister Ayeheart 
was born of these parents in the wilderness of Michigan. 
She w^as a small girl at the time of \Yayne's treaty, when 
the captives were released and returned to tlieir old home 
in western Virginia. Her father was so fond of Indian 
life, that he refused to leave them, and so never returned to 
civilized life. This is, in substance, the story as it was 
related to me by Sister Ayeheart, an estimable lady and 
sincere Christian. 

This prairie is some miles west of where the city of 
Laporte now stands. At the time I was there (June, 
1831) all of the northern part of the State of Indiana 
was owned by the Pottawattomie Indians, from its north- 
ern boundary, eighty miles southward, excepting ten 
miles square around Fort Wayne. 

While I Avasat this prairie, being excited by the Mor- 
mon imposture, I spoke much on the propriety of receiv- 
ing nothing as a revelation from God save the Bible. 
That the popular Protestant sects have, by their erro- 
neous teaching, prepared the masses for deceptions and all 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PBEACHER. 95 

manner of absurd and wicked impostures, is a proposition 
easily proved. 

From this place, I undertook to go to Chicago, but 
after traveling through a dense forest some twelve or 
fourteen miles, I came to a slough, in which my horse 
swamped. I dismounted, and stood on the grass until my 
noble steed struggled through the mire, and finally got out 
on the same side from which he had gone in. I mounted 
and retraced my steps, and was thus disappointed in get- 
ting to see the little village of Chicago. On my return, 
I was fearful that I would meet a party of some two hun- 
dred Sac Indians, that we had met some wrecks before at 
White Pigeon, on their way to Maiden, Canada. It was 
expected they would return about this time. The same 
day that I was swamped, I learned that the Sacs had 
passed through the Door prairie, and committed many 
depredations upon the citizens, by driving away horses and 
cattle. The Sacs were, at that time, hostile. The next 
year (1832), the Black Hawk war broke out. I was then 
far from the scenes of the war, being east of the Alleghany 
Mountains, in Pennsylvania. 

In the fall, after my return from the West, I attended a 
general meeting of Disciples, which was held at New Lis- 
bon, Columbiana County, Ohio. There were a number of 
preaching brethren at this meeting, and a large concourse 
of people for a number of days. The weather was fine, 
and the interest good. Of preachers, there were Thomas 
Campbell, father of Alexander Campbell, Walter Scott, 
Adamson Bentley, Cyrus Bosworth, William Hayden, John 
Henry, Matthew Clapp, John Whitacre, William Schooley, 
and some others. In daylight, the meetings were held in 
a beautiful grove, a little south of the town. 

On Saturday, Walter Scott made one of his happiest 
efforts. His discourse was founded on the following 



96 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

Scripture : " Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and be 
ready always to give an ans^Yer to every man that asketh 
you a reason of the hope that is in you.^' 1 Peter iii. 15. 

Brother Scott, in showing that the reason of the hope 
of the primitive Christians was the resurrection of the 
Son of God from the cold tomb of Joseph of Aramathea, 
and that the sublime and glorious object of their hope \yas 
an eternity of immortality of soul, body and spirit in the 
palace royal of the universe, was often very eloquent. 
He ransacked earth for an object of hope worthy the 
aspirations and towering ambition of man ; and found all 
to be perishable and perishing. But in the higher and 
more exalted circles of the universe, he found that which 
fills the most capacious mind, and the attainment of this re- 
fined and blissful state is made certain to those who hold 
out to the end, by the resurrection of David's Lord and 
David's Son. The speaker was in one of his happy moods. 
His discourse had a salutary effect on the large con- 
gregation. When he was through, he said to me : " Brother 
Mitchell, jump up here on the stand, and exhort these 
dear people.'^ I obeyed the mandate for some fifteen or 
twenty minutes. At the close of the grove meeting for 
the day, Brother Scott announced that there would be 
preaching in the meeting-house in town in the evening, 
by Brother IST. J. Mitchell ; then stooping down, he asked 
me in a low tone if I would preach. "Of course not,'^ 
said I. " Oh,'' said he, " the appointment has been made, 
and can not well be recalled. So you will preach this 
evening." 

Evening came, and with it came a large crowd into the 
meeting-house. In the pulpit sat Elder Thomas Camp- 
bell — as fine, as venerable, and as handsome a man of his 
age as, perhaps, could be found in all America, and, withal, 
as godly — and beside him sat Elder Walter Scott, while I 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 97 

was placed between tliem. On a chair immediately in 
front sat the veritable " Bishop of Buffalo/^ A. Camp- 
bell, the victor in three pitched battles — one with Walker, 
one with McCalla and one with Owen. His fame was as 
wide as civilization, and his superior abilities were ac- 
knowledged by pedobaptists, infidels and skeptics of every 
school. On each side of the pulpit sat other talented and 
distinguished preachers of the gospel. Brother Scott 
opened the exercises, and I delivered a discourse, not such 
as could have been delivered by the gentlemen mentioned, 
but just such a discourse as could be and was delivered by 
N. J. Mitchell, then twenty-two years old. The discourse 
was on the subject of the salvation mentioned by Paul, in 
the second chapter of Hebrews : " If the word spoken by 
angels was steadfast, and every transgression and disobe- 
dience received a j ust recompense of reward, how shall we 
escape if we neglect so great salvation ; which at the first 
began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto 
us by them that heard him?'' The analysis of the passage 
was as follows : 

1. The word spoken by angels was the law of Moses; 

2. Death was the penalty for many offenses under the 
law ; 

3. There is no sorer punishment which men can inflict 
than death; 

4. A sorer punishment is spoken of by Paul in this 
letter ; 

5. The sorer punishment must, therefore, be in a future 
world ; 

Therefore, the doctrine that adequate punishment for 
sin is inflicted in this life is not true. I closed with an 
exhortation to flee from the wrath to come by accepting 
the great salvation brought to and taught to our wretched 
race by the matchless Son of God. 
9 



98 EE3IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

Next day being Lord's day, a multitude was assembled 
in tlie grove. About 10 A. M. Fatber T. Campbell com- 
menced to speak on the importance of Christians attending 
to the breaking of the loaf on every Lord's day. He al- 
leged that it was the practice of the primitive Christians 
to do so ; and proved the proposition by scriptural quota- 
tions and sound reason. He then affirmed that the exam- 
ple of the primitive disciples, who were under the personal 
ministry and teaching of the inspired aj)ostles, was equiv- 
alent to a positive command to meet on the first day of 
the week to break the loaf. He protracted his discourse 
so that by the time the emblems had been served it was 
past eleven o'clock, at which hour it had been announced 
the day before, Alexander Campbell would preach. 

The Lord's supper now being over, the '' bishop " took 
the stand, and spoke "to a sea of upturned faces." He 
said that so much time had already elapsed, that he would 
not take up the subject upon which he had intended to 
preach, for he could not do it justice without imposing too 
much upon the patience of the audience. He read the 
following scripture, and delivered a discourse upon it : 
"Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up 
that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my 
flesh for his body's sake, which is the church." Colos- 
sians i. 24. The discourse was but an ordinary one for 
him to deliver* 

During this meeting. Brother John Henry was the bap- 
tist. He would take off his coat and jacket, roll up his 
shirt-sleeves above his elbows, then Avalk down into the 
water with the candidates, and immerse them with great 
solemnity and dignity. I judge he was something over six 
feet in height, and well proportioned. 

The closing part of this meeting was the question of the 
cooperation of the churches in order to the proclamation 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 99 

of the gospel in the regions round about. Brother A. 
Campbell referred to the Methodist system of operations 
as one of the most admirable for propagating that was 
ever devised. Their alternating modus operandi was what 
he had reference to, and he thought the brethren would do 
well to inaugurate and carry out some system that would 
prove more efficient than the present one. After Brother 
Campbell was through, Brother Scott arose and said : 
^^ Brethren, even the publicans and harlots show Brother 
Campbell the way into the kingdom of God," quoting 
George Campbell's version of the passage, which, in the 
common version, reads : '^ The publicans and harlots enter 
into the kingdom of God before you.'^ 

After the meeting adjourned. Father Thomas Campbell 
and I rode in company as far as to Elder Joseph Gaston's, 
a noble spirit and excellent preacher of the apostolic 
gospel. He was a brother of our more Avidely known 
brother, James E. Gaston, now of Iowa. Brother Joseph 
died comparatively young. He resided at the time of his 
death about twenty miles south-west of New Lisbon. 
The conversation of Father Campbell, while riding along 
the road, was cheerful, lively and very instructive. He 
told me that his old lady had given him up entirely, 
that he might travel and instruct the churches, and aid' 
in putting them in order. I left him at Brother Gaston's 
and went on down south, preaching the word in Harrison 
and Belmont counties. 

In January, 1832, I returned to Minerva, Stark County, 
Ohio, and on the 12th day of the same month was mar- 
ried to Miss Sarah Bye Packer, by Elder John Whitacre, 
at his own house. Sarah is his niece by marriage, his 
wife being her mother's sister. After our marriage, we 
went to visit my parents in Belmont County, Ohio; and, 
about the last of March, set out in a carriage to visit my 



100 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

wife^s mother, brothers, and little half sisters, who resided 
at Howard, Centre County, Pennsylvania. Our intention 
was to visit her relatives a few weeks and then return to 
Ohio. My wife's grandmother, four aunts (her mother's 
sisters), two uncles (her mother's brothers), all resided in 
the region round about Minerva and New Garden. She, 
at the age of eighteen years, came from Pennsylvania to 
visit her relatives in Ohio. When she came to her uncle 
John Whitacre's, she was a zealous Methodist, having 
been an active member of a class of Methodists in her 
nativ,e place, Howard, Pennsylvania. Brother AVhitacrc 
soon turned her attention and thoughts to the apostolic 
preaching and teaching, and, being sincere, talented and 
devoted to the Lord, she soon learned "the way of the 
Lord more perfectly," and was immersed by her brother 
and uncle Whitacre. 

On our way to the east, I stopped and held a meeting 
at Wheeling, Virginia. I received a letter of introduc- 
tion from Brother Encel^ with directions to stop at Rob- 
ert Douglas's, a member of the church at Pittsburgh. We 
left Wheeling on Monday morning, went by way of 
Washington and Canonsburg, and arrived at Pittsburgh 
on Tuesday. I commenced to preach on Wednesday 
evening, in a meeting-house at the junction, or on the 
point between the Monongahela and Alleghany Rivers, 
and preached every evening that week but one, when a 
Brother Payne from Kentucky spoke. On Lord's day 
forenoon I spoke on the seven units named hy Paul 
in the 4th chapter of Ephesians : " There is one body, 
spirit, etc." At the close I gave an invitation to obe- 
dience, when two lads responded, and were immersed by 
one of the elders of the church. These lads, I learned, 
were brothers Isaac and Joseph J. Errett, now both no- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 101 

ble preachers and teachers of the word, which they have 
been for many years. 

I left Pittsburgh on Monday morning, and took the 
northern turnpike as far as to Water Street, passing 
through Blairsville, Ebensburg, Duncanville, and Holli- 
daysburg; where we left the pike, and by way of Bir- 
mingham, ^yalkerville, Bellefonte and Milesburg, arrived 
on the 12th day of April, 1832, at Howard, Centre 
County, Pennsylvania. 

The first time I sav,^ a mountain was on this trip. I 
had seen many high hills, but never before saw a mount- 
ain. When we first came in sight of the great Alleghany 
ridges, stretching off as far as the eye could reach, the 
smoky, or rather blue vaporing appearance of the far- 
distant peaks — the numberless cones perched on wide, 
elevated bases ; .the thousands on thousands of hemlock, 
white and yellow pine trees, with their huge trunks and 
swaying branches ; the millions of ever-verdant leaves ; 
the cascades and deep gorges ; the flowing streams and 
warbling brooks.; the general appearance of the rude and 
vastly deformed mountains — filled me with amazement. I 
looked and looked again, until looking became wearisome 
as well as useless, for the scene could not possibly be 
comprehended in one view, nor could each interesting 
object, in such a vast variety, be examined in detail, 
xs'ow, placed on top of the western ridge, we see before 
us what appears to be an interminable, boundless wilder- 
ness. Turning to look back, we see afar down and far 
off the scenes which are more grandly presented to viev/ 
than when we passed over the ground. Now, we behold 
farms, farm-houses and barns, fields by the side of fields, 
with flocks and herds of sheep and kine. Nor is the 
mind feasted through the sense of sight only. The wild 
woods are the home of many species of wild birds, whose 



102 EEMINISOENOES AND INCIDENTS 

joyous notes are now and again heard in the song and 
its echo from peak to peak. Indeed, the mountains, the 
first time I saw them, were the grandest sight I ever be- 
held. 

Two days after my arrival at Howard, a Methodist 
gentleman called to see us. When about to leave he 
said: "We have our weekly prayer-meeting to-morrow 
evening, and would be glad to have you come over and 
meet with us; we will dispense with the prayer-meeting, 
and hear you preach.^^ I replied that I thanked him 
kindly for his courtesy, but preferred to decline the in- 
vitation, on the ground that it would not be doing justice 
to the members of the prayer-meeting ; that the gospel of 
Christ, as I understood it, and as I preached it, was so 
different from Methodist preaching, that in fact it v/as 
not the same thing ; that if I preached in the neighborhood 
at all, I would have an appointment circulated independent 
of all other appointments and of all denominations ; that 
I did not intend to insinuate myself into the graces of 
any religious body of people. The gentleman to whom 
I thus talked was Mr. Robert Baker, a prominent mem- 
ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church of the vicinity. 

Now, it must be borne in mind that eastward from 
Howard there was no congregation of Disciples of Christ 
nearer than Philadelphia, some two hundred miles distant. 
Westward, I knew of none nearer than Pittsburgh. I 
learned afterwards that there was a small congregation at 
Ebensburg, about seventy miles south-west of Howard. 

I made an appointment to preach in my mother-in-law^s 
house, I think it was the third Lord's day of April. The 
house was filled to its utmost capacity, and many persons 
were standing in the door-yard. I read for a lesson that 
day, Daniel the prophet's interpretation of the dream of 
the king of Babylon, and selected as the part more par- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 103 

ticularly to whicli attention ^^^'as called, the following : " In 
the days of those kings shall the God of heaven set up a 
kingdom, etc/^ The object was to show that the kingdom 
was set up on the day of Pentecost, and this necessitated 
the reading; and analvsis of Peter^s discourse on the day of 
Pentecost. I made an appointment to preach on the next 
Lord's day, in a meeting-house belonging to a congregation 
of Mennonites, or the followers of Menno Simon, which 
was in the vicinity. 

When the time appointed arrived, I was there, by the 
Divine favor, as well, also, as a very large audience. I 
took up the subject where I had left it the previous Lord's 
day, and showed that Peter and the other apostles preached 
in pursuance of the last commission given them by the 
great Head of the Church, just before his ascension into 
heaven; that the conditions of salvation from sin were 
contained in the commission, and that Peter offered pardon 
on these conditions. I then stated that the same condi- 
tions were in force now, and as obligatory, as on the day 
of Pentecost, and gave an invitation, upon which Miss 
Harriet Way re.sponded. She had learned something 
about the ancient gospel from having heard my brother 
James preach some years previous in the State of Mary- 
land. I knew that he had preached in that State in the 
year 1828. 

Xever till this day had the waters of Bald Eagle Creek 
been moved by the person of any candidate or subject, in 
being immersed into the name of the Father, the Son, 
and the Holy Spirit, in order to the remission of sins. 
Long had its limpid waters rolled at the base of Muncy 
Mountain. Long ago had multitudes, from time to time, 
assembled near the margin of this beautiful stream for va- 
rious purposes ; but never at any time had a congregation 
assembled to witness the immersion of one who, upon pro- 



104 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

fession of faith in the divine Redeemer, had resolved to be 
buried with Christ in baptism for the y^emission of sins. I 
felt more than usually solemn. The spectators appeared 
solemn. The circumstances were to me, to the audience, 
and to all, new and peculiar. The news of an effort in 
what was then called "the West,^' to restore primitive 
Christianity, had not reached this part of the country. 
The people here were not aware that there was another 
man on earth who preached as I did, and who invited the 
j)eople to obey the gospel forthwith; and now, to-day 
^' Obey the gospel,^^ was to them a new and an odd phrase. 

On the next Lord's day, I preached again in the Men- 
nonite meeting-house, when, upon an invitation given, a 
young man came forward to obey, and was immersed at 
the same place where the lady had been on the previous 
Lord's day. This pair became man and wife in the follow- 
ing October, and vv^ere the first couple w^hom I joined in 
matrimony in the Bald Eagle valley. 

These tw^o persons having become disciples of Christ, I 
thought it proper to set the Lord's table, that w^e might 
continue steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine, in fellowship, 
in breaking of bread, and in prayer. I did not then un- 
derstand the " fellowship " to mean contribution, nor do I 
so understand it now. So, on the next Lord's day, five of 
us sat around the Lord's table, and broke the loaf of bless- 
ing. These five were my wife and I, the two who had re- 
cently obeyed the gospel, and Henry B. Yarnel, who came 
nine miles to see what had " broken loose " at Howard. 
This occurred under the shadow of three or four swamp 
oak trees, in a meadow. Brother Yarnel had been a sub- 
scriber to and reader of the " Christian Baptist/^ and was a 
member of the Baptist church at Milesburg. He had 
learned from the " Christian Baptist " something of the 
" ancient order of things/' and at once united with us to 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 105 

keep the ordinances as they had been de-livered by the in- 
spired apostles, and whom we believed to be the only au- 
thoritative teachers of Christianity. We did not stop to 
inquire whether there "were any Christians among the 
sects ; '^ nor did we inquire whether the unbaptized had a 
right to commune. These were to us questions of a too 
modern date for our discussion. We were too far back for 
this. We had gone back of Protestantism, back of the 
long, dark niglit of superstition and error superinduced 
by Roman Catholicism ; we had, in short, gone beyond 
the apocryphal writings of Clement and Barnabas, and 
reached the days of hale, unmixed Christianity, as recorded 
on the pages of the sacred writings of evangelists and 
apostles. The object w^as to restore primitive Christianity, 
in letter and in spirit, in faith and in obedience. We said : 
"Here is the table of the Lord, and upon it are the em- 
blems of the broken body and shed blood of the Son of 
the living God. Let a man examine himself, and so let 
him eat of this bread and drink of this cup.^^ 

Here was a church consisting of five members. They 
called no man master. The object of their faith was 
Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God, the only Saviour of 
sinners. They had met in his name, to keep the ordi- 
nances as delivered by the inspired apostles; and to ex- 
hort one another to continue in the faith, looking for 
the mercy of Christ unto eternal life. They asked no 
denomination of professed Christians to fraternize with 
them; nor did they seek a fraternization with any sect, 
either of philosophers or religionists. Their number was 
but five, still Christ^s promise was remembered with 
much pleasure : " Where two or three are gathered to- 
gether in my name, there am I in the midst.^^ 

A number of persons had come to this meeting from 
the Beech Creek neighborhood, some six miles down 



106 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

the Bald Eagle valley ; and tliey invited me to go there 
and preach a few discourses, upon Avhich I gave them 
an appointment. When I went there, I found a large 
congregation assembled in a beautiful grove on a small 
island. This was ISTestlerode^s island. Mr. John Xestle- 
rode, a member of the Mennonite church, had fixed 
seats in the grove, by. laying up boards ft'om his saw- 
mill, which was contiguous to the grove ; had erected a 
platform betAveen two trees for me to occupy as a pul- 
pit, and bored a hole in one of the trees for a pin on 
which to hang my hat. On a board, breast high, above 
the stand, lay a Bible. All things being ready, I mounted 
the stand, and commenced by reading one of Addison^s 

hymns : 

"The spacious firmament on high, 
With all the blue ethereal sky, etc." 

I then proceeded to pray, opening the meeting in the 
usual manner, and folloAved with a discourse. The audi- 
ence was large and attentive, some of all religious par- 
ties being present, the excitement concerning the new 
gospel having reached there from Howard. A gentle- 
man was present who was a justice of the peace, a Pres- 
byterian by profession, and a sort of oracle in the vicinity, 
who reported that I was certainly an infidel, because I 
had read the hymn which was admired by Thomas Paine. 
I had occupied this stand but two Lord's days, when 
the jMethodists undertook to take possession of my sylvan 
premises, and appointed a protracted meeting to be held 
on the island, to commence on a Saturday. I learned 
their programme, and found that I could have from two 
o'clock to four P. M., on Lord's day, so I sent an ap- 
pointment. I was on hand at two o'clock, and j)reached 
until about a quarter of four; gave an invitation, and 
nine persons responded. We repaired to the beautiful 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 107 

stream (Beech Creek), and the crowd followed, lining 
the banks on both sides. I stood on the shore and spoke 
for half an hour on the design of baptism, and then went 
into the water to immerse the candidates. This procedure 
was a novelty ; the people were excited, curiosity was rife, 
and the Methodists were mad. They abandoned the whole 
island ; went to Mr. Kirk's barn to continue their meeting, 
and left us the victors in full possession of the field. I 
continued to occupy this post until the weather became so 
cold, in the fall, that we were compelled to occupy a barn, 
and, when that became too cold, we went into a log school- 
house that was not far off, but was entirely too small for 
all that were desirous of hearing. In the course of a few 
months, I immersed about ninety persons in this vicinity, 
and organized a church by the appointment of three elders 
and two deacons. 

It has, no doubt, been observed by the reader, that I 
have said nothing about preaching except on Lord's days. 
How is this? Through the week the people were search- 
ing the Scriptures. Every spare hour from their secular 
employments was, by many, occupied in examining the 
sacred Scriptures. Some were searching to see whether 
these things were so; some to find proof to justify their 
opposition to what they had heard; and others to prove 
that we were preaching the truth as taught in the Bible. 
Xever, from the first settlement of the country, had the 
Bible been read and studied so much, or one-tenth part 
so much, in the same length of time, as in a few months 
of this year — so a number of the old settlers informed me. 

During that summer I worked considerably on the old 
homestead farm, where my wife was born and raised. She 
and I took a room in the house w^here mother-in-law lived, 
and tliere, secluded froin the world, v\'e resided. Among 
other things at which I worked, I drove a team of oxen 



108 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

named Dich and Jack, They were a strongs tractable, and 
willing yoke of cattle, which was demonstrated when I 
plowed with them, furrow about, with a first rate team of 
horses, driven by an active young man, for three consecu- 
tive days. It must not be thought that these were the 
only oxen in the country; for I well remember that the 
first contribution made to me as a preacher were two 
bushels of good wheat, brought to us on an ox, by 
Philip Confer ; this, together with some mackerel brought 
to me by Job Kendel, was quite acceptable to us in our 
commencement at housekeeping. 

The congregation at Howard, first organized when there 
were only five of us, grew and multiplied considerably; 
and the Lord added to the church, from time to time, such 
as should be saved. 

About the middle of October of this year I left home, 
and made a tour to Ohio, to visits my parents, and preach 
as opportunity offered. I went to Belmont County, Ohio, 
via Pittsburgh, Wellsburg and Wheeling. The inhab- 
itants had pretty much forsaken Bridgeport, opposite 
"Wheeling, in consequence of the ravages of the Asiatic 
cholera. This year was the first time this dreadful scourge 
of mankind made its appearance in the United States. 
The first cases reported in this country were at Plattsburg, 
Kew York. 

After visiting my parents, I went through Harrison, 
Carroll, Columbiana, Stark and Wayne counties, and into 
Holmes, preaching the word in various places. Returning, 
I passed through Wayne, Stark, Columbiana and Trum- 
bull counties, in Ohio, thence into Mercer County, Penn., 
and stopped with Brother Battenfield, whom I had known 
in Wheeling, Va., and of whom I have already spoken. 
I struck a ^^bee line'' from Brother Battenfield's to Miles- 
burg, Centre County. I passed through Centreville, 



IN THE LTFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 109 

crossed the Alleghany River at Frederick, struck the 
Philadelphia and Erie turnpike at Strattenvllle, then via 
Brookville, Curwensville and Phillipsburg, I reached 
Howard safely, just six weeks from the day I left, and on 
the day appointed when I left. 

It was now December, and the weather cold. I would 
here say to the young reader, that in those days there 
were no railroad facilities, such as we have now. For 
locomotion, we depended upon our faithful horses to carry 
us over rugged mountains, up and down steep hills, and 
through mud and sloughs. Now, time and distance are 
almost annihilated by means of the majestic locomotive, 
and in the comfortable palace cars we may ride both day 
and night, asleep or awake, as suits our feelings and con- 
venience. Those whose birth and rearing have been 
since the multiplication of railroads, can not understand the 
toil and labor that Avere necessary in order to travel thou- 
sands of miles over illy-constructed public roads. It has 
been my fortune, or misfortune, to have lived on yon side 
and on this side of railroad facilities, and I have, for many 
thousands of miles, tried both ways of travel. The rail- 
road mode is decidedly the most rapid way of travel, and, 
perhaps, the safest to life and limb ; but whether it 
proves to be the pleasantest or not depends upon the 
mind and temperament of the traveler. One thing is cer- 
tain, the application of science to the practical business 
of life has wrought a wonderful change in human affairs, 
which does not apply alone to the physical condition of 
man, but greatly affects his morals also. The all-absorb- 
ing question now is, " Will it pay ?" meaning pecuniarily. 
The excitement is every-where so great in the construction 
of railroads, railroad cars, steamboats, and all sorts' of 
improvements and patents that men scarcely find time for 
any thing else. And last, but not least, the improvements 



110 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

in the art of printing are so great that reading matter is 
thrown broadcast over the land, and a very large propor- 
tion of it of a most demoralizing character. People and 
things appear rather to be floundering about in a whirl- 
pool than calmly moving on the surface of a smooth sea. 
The things of time, in a noise and constant bustle, attract 
most attention, and but little time is left for thought, re- 
flection and meditation on the awful realities and unend- 
ing things of eternity. 

Having arrived at Howard, my business Avas next to 
see after the welfare of the young converts, whom I had. 
not seen for six weeks. By this time the sectarian clergy 
had raised a great hue and cry againt the ancient gospel. 
Those who had obeyed the gospel of God were denom- 
inated " Mitchellites/^ heretics, infidels, w^ater-dabblers, 
etc. One preacher of the Methodist fraternity reported, 
when T went back to Ohio, that the matter would soon 
subside. ^^The young man has gone off and left his 
wife,'^ said he, ^^ and w^ill not likely return. ^^ 

I must now go back a little chronologically. In Oc- 
tober, just before starting to Ohio, I was invited to preach 
in a school-house, tw^elve miles down the valley from 
Howard, and as I always preached where opportunity 
offered, I sent an appointment. When I came there, the 
school-house was locked, and we could not gain admit- 
tance. A Methodist local preacher, by the name of 
Thompson, was teaching school in the house at the time, 
and had locked it securely against us. The citizens of 
the neighborhood had fixed up temporary seats in a 
grove near by, and a large assembly had gathered to 
hear '' the heretic.'^ I read the following words of 
Holy Scripture : " Then breathed he on them, and said, 
"Eeceive ye the Holy Spirit. As my Father sent me, even so 
send I you.'' I arranged my discourse as follows: 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. Ill 

1. Q\\ici^i^?> personal mission Avas to the Jews only. ^^I 
^vas not sent," says he, '^ but to the lost sheep of the 
house of Israel." 

2. The apostles were sent to all the world ; but were 
to tarry at Jerusalem until they were endued with power 
from on high; that is, miraculous power. 

3. The Spirits' mission was, first, to speak in words hj 
the apostles' mouths ; second, those who obeyed the gos- 
pel preached by the apostles were promised the gift of 
the Holy Spirit, not the miraculous gift of the Spirit; 
but that of goodness, which might be known by its fruits. 

From here I had an invitation from Dr. G. C. Harvey, 
Avho was then a Methodist, but wavering in the truth of 
Methodism, to preach at Salona, in Xittany Valley, 
four miles from where I then was, and I gave an ap- 
pointment. At the time appointed I was there, and 
found an audience assembled in a meeting-house owned 
in common by the Lutheran and German Reformed con- 
gregations. The house had a gallery, and the pulpit was 
quite elevated, and in the shape of an oblong box that 
would hold about two persons. I ascended the steps, 
took my seat in the box, and deliberately surveyed the 
audience who were seated below. This being a week day, 
the congregation was not so large as to require any to be 
seated in the gallery. I looked down into the altar, 
which was a little elevated above the common level of 
the floor, and wished to be there rather than in the box. 
While thus ruminating and musing, a gentleman came 
up into the box, took a seat, and commenced to ask ques- 
tions : 

"Do you belong," said he, "to the conference?" 

" I do not belong to any conference," I replied. 

" Do you believe in the Trinity ? " he next asked. 

" What is that ? " responded I. 



112 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

"Well, well, well, do you believe that Christ is equal 
to God?'^ continued he. 

"Certainly,'^ said I; "I believe all of the sacred Scrip- 
tures, from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Rev- 
elation. ^He, being in the form of God, thought it not 
robbery to be equal with him ! ^ ^^ 

"Well,'^ said he, "I came on purpose to hear you. I 
am anxious to hear you; but we have a rule that no man 
is permitted to occupy the pulpit unless he is a member 
of the conference." 

I again remarked that I did not belong to the confer- 
ence. "Then, will you please stand in the altar and 
preach?" inquired my courteous friend. 

" With pleasure," I remarked. " I shall decidedly 
prefer to speak from the altar. I do not like these ele- 
vated pulpits. They place us too far from the people, 
and sound naturally rises; and, besides, I am not much 
accustomed to pulpits at any rate. I am not accustomed 
to be exalted above measure." 

My friend Avalked down, I followed, and took up my 
position in the altar. I gave out a hymn, which was 
sung, then prayed, next read a portion of PauFs letter to 
the Galatians, and called partiGulai' attention to the fol- 
lowing language : " Though Ave, or an angel from heaven, 
preach any other gospel unto you than that which we 
have preached, let him be accursed." As we said before, 
so say I again, " though we or an angel from heaven preach 
any other gospel unto you than that which you have re- 
ceived, let him be accursed." 

At the conclusion of the discourse, I knew an impres- 
sion had been made favorable to the claims of the ancient 
gospel. I showed what had been preached by the Apostle 
Paul, and contrasted it sharply with modern gospels, 
and perversions of the true gospel. Just before dismis- 



7^ THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 113 

sion, I told the people that I would be glad to preach 
again in the neighborhood, if we could be accommodated 
w^ith a house without infringing on the rights and privileges 
of others, at which an elderly and portly gentleman arose 
in the audience, and said: ^'Come on, sir; make the 
appointment at an early day, as early as will at all suit 
your convenience; make the appointment in this house, 
cmd to preach in the pulpit, if you wdsh. If there are only 
six men come, we shall be able to take the house and the 
pulpit. This house was built with the public money. 
The intolerant and bigoted spirit that will not allow a 
man to preach in the pulpits of our meeting-houses, built 
by public munificence, who preaches the truth as con- 
tained in the Bible, must and shall be put down/^ 

This gentleman was a man of distinction, a highly edu- 
cated German, and perhaps the most popular physician 
in the county. I did not, however, leave an appointment 
at that time; but sent one soon afterwards to preach in 
the public school-house, in the village of Salona, about 
a quarter of a mile from this meeting-house, and in about 
six weeks was on hand to fill the appointment. I think 
it was at this second meeting that Sister Harriet C. Best 
responded to an invitation to obey the gospel, and was 
buried with Christ in baptism. She was the wife of one 
of the most respectable, intelligent and infiuential men in 
the vicinity ; had an extensive family connection, was a 
member of the German Reformed Church, and displayed 
much firmness and independence of character by obe- 
dience, against much opposition. One brother had obeyed 
before she did, and soon after her husband, her father 
and mother, five brothers and two sisters, and other more 
distant relatives became obedient to the faith. Her obe- 
dience, by exciting the interest of her family, and leading 
them to investigate the subject, no doubt had a powerful 
10 



114 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

influence in bringing them to Clirist. They at first felt 
violently opposed to her course, but, being honest and in- 
telligent, their examination of the question resulted as 
above stated. All the members of this family have since | 

exercised a powerful influence for the cause of primitive 
Christianity, several of them becoming preachers of the 
word, and most of them being yet alive and working for 
the Master's cause. Sister Best, after becoming better 
ccquiiiited, informed me that my first effort, when the 
contrast was drawn between the ancient gospel and all 
modern gospels, had led her mind into a new field of 
investigation, and that the more she thought about it the 
stronger the contrast became, until she fully made up 
her mind to obey. 

I continued to preach at this place, from time to time, 
and a church was soon organized after the primitive 
model (Brother S. E. Shepard coming to my aid from 
Bradford County) which would compare favorably with 
any congregation known to me for intelligence and devo- 
tion to the cause of Christ. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 115 



CHAPTEE Y. 

Description of the Bald Eagle valley and surrounding country — Wil- 
liamsport — Scene in a meeting-house — Lapel of a brother's coat torn 
off— Mennonites and disciples build a meeting-house — Know nothing 
of dedicating a house to the Lord — Visit to Bradford County — First 
acquaintance -svith Dr. S. E. Shepard. 

In order that those not acquainted with the geography 
of the country in which my labors were performed may 
have some idea of the field which needed so many laborers 
and had so few, it will be necessary to give some descrip- 
tion of the valleys in which I endeavored to sow the seed 
of the kingdom. 

All of central Pennsylvania is a succession of mountains 
and valleys, drained by the Susquehanna Piver and its 
tributaries. The mountains range south-west and north- 
east, following the great Alleghany chain, of which they 
are, in fact, a part. They give the whole country a ro- 
mantic beauty impossible to describe, and no doubt greatly 
affect the character of the inhabitants. Social intercourse 
flows more naturally up and down the valleys, as the 
mountains are almost impassable barriers to travel, except 
as they are broken through by streams, which form passes 
at intervals through them. These valleys vary in width 
from one to five miles, and with the mountains, covered 
always with verdure, forming natural walls, together with 
their own fertility and beauty, their gushing springs and 
rippling brooks, there is perhaps no country in the world 
by which they are- surpassed. 



116 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

The Bald Eagle valley is the middle of a great basin, 
so that it receives the drainage of the valleys lying on 
both sides of it, which is carried into it by beautiful, pure 
streams of water, the most ]3rominent of which are Spring, 
Marsh, Beech, and Fishing creeks. In speaking of this 
valley as the middle of a basin, the idea must not be re- 
ceived that the sides of the basin are smooth and un- 
broken. To one standing within it, the mountains which 
wall it in appear as lofty as the Alleghany itself. But on 
standing upon the summit of the Alleghany, it becomes 
quite manifest to the eye that there is a regular and quite 
rapid descent from both sides towards the bottom of the 
Bald Eagle Creek. This fall it is which hurries the trib- 
utaries of this stream through valley and mountain, until 
they fall into the bottom of the great basin, and are borne 
onward to the Susquehanna. The gorges where these 
tributaries break through the mountain-wall, have a sav- 
age grandeur which the hand of man can never tame, and 
the walls often rise almost perpendicularly, high above 
the head of the traveler, and will stand everlasting monu- 
ments of nature's untamed sublimity, bidding defiance to 
the puny hands which have tamed and cultivated the ad- 
joining valleys. 

The valley of the Bald Eagle is fifty miles long, and 
has an average width of about a mile and a half. It has 
its name from the creek wdiich flows through its entire 
length in a north-easterly direction, and empties into the 
west branch of the Susquehanna Eiver, eighteen miles 
below my home, at Howard. It was along this beautiful 
stream that most of my labor in the gospel w^as performed 
during more than thirty-six years, and the first home I 
ever owned, in which my children grew to maturity 
around me, was within a few rods of its limpid waters. 
The organization of which I have made mention, at Sa- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 117 

lona, was in Nittany Valley, which runs parallel with the 
one in which I lived, and was divided from it by the 
Muncy Mountain. Salona was reached by ascending Fish- 
ing Creek, passing through the notch it makes in the 
mountain and into the valley beyond, where the little 
village nestles at the mountain's base, and in its huge 
shadow. 

The city of Williamsport, Pennsylvania, is located on 
the left bank of the Susquehanna River, about twenty-five 
miles below tlie mouth of the Bald Eagle Creek. My 
wife had two brothers residing in this place, then a town 
of a thousand or fifteen hundred inhabitants, and the 
county seat of Lycoming County. While on a visit to 
them, an appointment was made for me to preach in the 
court-house, which I accordingly did to a large and in- 
telligent congregation. From this meeting, I returned to 
the house of my brother-in-law, William F. Packer. 
With him, at that time, boarded Dr. P — ■ — , who was a phy- 
sician and a Presbyterian clergyman, and had been at the 
meeting. He commenced a conversation for the purpose, 
as was evident to me, of getting up a religious controversy, 
which I thought best to evade. 

^^ How common," said he, "it is for men to denounce 
what they regard as erroneous, and immediately fall into 
errors as gross as those they denounce.'' 

"Very true, sir," said I, "nothing more common." 

" I have," said he, " heard men speaking against the Cal- 
vinistic system of interpreting the Scriptures, and then 
make themselves ridiculous by trying to interpret the 
Scriptures in opposition to Calvin's views. I never could 
unlock many passages that are in the Scriptures, until I 
got hold of the key of Calvinism ; since that, I have had 
no trouble." 

" Doctor," said I, " I use another key — that of common 



118 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

sense. If I can not understand a passage by a fair gram- 
matical analysis^ I despair of understanding it, or unlock- 
ing it by the use of any other key.'' 

" Suppose/' said he, " we each propose to the other a 
passage. You use your key and I will use mine, and see 
how w^e wdll succeed." 

" Agreed, doctor," I responded ; " you propose a pas- 
sage." 

" No," he replied, " you propose one." 

" I will do so," I said, " if you insist upon it." 

" I do insist," said the doctor. 

" The passage I propose," said I, " for you to unlock 
with the key of Calvinism is this : 

"^Salute Andronicus and Junia, my kinsmen, who are 
of note among the apostles, and were also in Christ before 
me.' — Rom. xvi. 7. 

" On the hypothesis of Calvin, how did these persons 
get into Christ before Paul if each Christian that ever 
did or ever shall live was in Christ before time began — in 
eternity — before there w^as any before or after f 

"These persons," said he, "were Christians before Paul 
was converted, "while he was persecuting the church." 

" Just so, doctor," I said ; " the passage is not difficult 
to unlock with my key, but I am opposed to your using 
my key ; you should have used your own." 

" I believe dinner is about ready," he remarked ; and 
then exit the admirer of the key of Calvinism. 

After this, I preached several times in the court-house 
at Williamsport ; but my field was getting too large to be 
attended to by one man, and I abandoned the idea of con- 
tinuing my labors there. The hearing was good; and the 
attention marked ; indeed, I was never in a place where 
the indications w^ere better for the gathering in of a rich 
harvest of souls; but, truly, the laborers were few. A 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PBEACHEB. 119 

conspicuous gentleman, a justice of the peace, and pos- 
sessed of some wealth, said to me : ^' Mr. Mitchell, when 
you have an opportunity to make appointments in this 
town, send them to me. I will publish them to be in our 
meeting-house.'^ He was a member of the German Ee- 
formed Church ; and they, at that time, owned the best 
meeting-house in the place. Accordingly, I sent an ap- 
pointment, and went on and filled it, having a crowded 
house in the evening. 

I went round next morning to call on my liberal friend 

Mr. G , who had made the appointment for me. After 

the usual salutations, and the compliments of the morning, 
said he : " Mr. Mitchell, I came near having a fight last 
evening. I went into our meeting-house to sweep and 
brush it out, and make a fire, preparatory to the evening 

meeting. While attending to this business. Brother D 

came in and asked me for the keys of the desk. 

" What do you want with them ? '^ said I. 

" I w^ish to open the desk,'' said he, " and get out the 
constitution of our church, to see if it don't prohibit a 
Unitarian preacher from preaching in this house. I am 
told that Mr. Mitchell is a Unitarian." 

" I know better than that," said I ; " I have heard him 
preach several times. I know he preaches according to the 
Bible, and that sort of preaching is good enough for me. 
You shall not have the keys unless you are stronger than 

I am." Whereupon Brother D took hold of me by the 

throat. I gave him a little tap, and pushed him loose from 
me, and made another pass at him ; this time taking hold 
of the lapel of his coat, tearing it off and throwing it 
down upon the floor. Just then your brother-in-law, Mr. 
John P. Packer, came in, and, walking up to the altar, 
he interfered and stopped the fight. But for this inter- 
ference, I should have given Brother D a complete 



120 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

trouncing, for he richly deserved it. Brother D is 

a good brother, but ignorant, and deserved a complete 
licking!^' 

Such is substantially the relation, of the aifair, as given 
me by Mr. G . 

I remembered now a little piece of advice given me by 
Brother Campbell, just before I left Ohio. I was over to 
Buffalo to see him, and, among other things, he asked 
where I had preached mostly for the last year. I told 
him where I had been, and my labors had been scattered 
over a large area. ^^Do you not often baptize persons," 
said he, '^ where there is no organization for them to unite 
with?" I answered in the affirmative. "Well," said 
Brother Campbell, " this reminds me of a passage of scrip- 
ture: ^ Loose him, and let him go.' What would you 
think of a man who would take a bushel of wheat in a 
bag, and go and sow it over fifteen or twenty acres of 
land? Do you not scatter your labors too much? I would 
advise you to cultivate a smaller field." 

I determined to follow this advice of Brother Campbell, 
therefore confined my labors principally to the lower part 
of Bald Eagle valley, and one place (Salona) in the lower 
end of Nittany Valley, being careful to keep near the 
streams, where there was much water. This was where 
the people lived mostly; and, besides, it met the objection 
that immersion could not be essential to salvation, because 
there is not sufficient w^ater in which to immerse in sandy 
deserts and such like places. The beautiful streams of 
the Bald Eagle valley suggested forcibly the application 
of Heb. X. 22: "Having your hearts sprinkled from an 
evil conscience, and your bodies washed with pure water ; " 
for no streams known to me are more pure than these. 

The congregation of disciples at Beech Creek now de- 
termined to build a meeting-house, and they met accord- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 121 

ingly to adopt measures for the accomplishment of this 
end. In conjunction with the Mennonites of the neigh- 
borhood, they appointed a committee, circulated a sub- 
scription, and, in a few months, had a house ready for 
occupancy, forty by forty-five feet. A badly proportioned 
house, but the committee were not skilled in this kind of 
architecture, and I had been so accustomed to preaching 
in the woods, in rude school-houses, barns, etc., that I 
could give them but little light on the question of build- 
ing meeting-houses. I thought I understood preaching 
the gospel and baptizing believers pretty well, but pro- 
fessed no skill whatever in the planning and erection of 
meeting-houses; nor did I know how to "dedicate a house 
to the Lord,^' especially as I knew what Paul said in the 
hearing of the Supreme Court of Athens: "Who dwelleth 
not in temples made with hands, nor is worshiped by men's 
hands, as though he needed any thing.'' The house being 
ready to be occupied, we were green enough to go in and 
worship the Lord, just as we had been accustomed to do 
when we met in private dwellings, in school-houses, or in 
a grove. We thought, in our simplicity, that we made a 
proper application of Christ's language to the woman of 
Samaria, when we quoted the passage to prove that the 
Lord had no houses that were especially his by dedica- 
tion: "I say unto you that the hour cometh, when neither 
in this mountain (pointing to Gerizim) nor yet at Jerusa- 
lem, shall ye worship the Father. Ye worship ye know 
not what : we know what we worship ; for salvation is of 
the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the 
true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and in 
truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God 
is a Spirit : and they that worship him must worship him 
in spirit and in truth." We were also green enough, at 
that time, to believe that to appoint was to ordain — that 
11 



122 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

elders (overseers) were selected and appointed to the over- 
sight^ and Avere by such selection ordained; therefore, hav- 
ing no gift to be stirred up, which was given by prophecy 
and the laying on of apostolic hands/we simply ordained, 
that is, we appointed them. When Paul said to Titus: 
" For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest 
set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders ^^ 
(kia katasteesees kata polin presbuterous), literally "and 
in every city constitute elders ^' — appoint a council of ex- 
perienced men, that there may be government in the con- 
gregation. 

About the month of June, 1833, I met a young lady 
who had heard me preach that year for the first time. 
Her father, mother, brothers, and a number of her sisters 
lived in that neighborhood. The young people were all 
grown, and most of them had already obeyed the gospel, 
while she was on a visit to a married sister who resided 
in Bradford County, Pa. She said to me that there was 
a man up in Bradford County who preached the same 
doctrine that I did. I told her that could hardly be 
possible ; that I thought I knew all our preachers, either 
personally or by reputation. Can it be possible, thought 
I, that there is a man within a hundred miles of this place, 
of whom I have not heard, who is preaching the primitive 
gospel? What is the name of the gentleman? I inquired. 
She replied, " Silas E. Shepard, and I know he preaches 
the same doctrine you did to-day. ^^ Her positiveness 
convinced me that there was something in the report, and 
I determined to go to some pains, if necessary, to make 
the acquaintance of my fellow-laborer in Bradford County. 
The lady, shortly after, went back to her sister's, and re- 
ported to the disciples of Canton, Bradford County, Pa., 
the doings of one Mitchell down in Centre County. Soon 
after this, Brother Elias Rockwell wrote to me to come 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHEB. 123 

up and assist in holding a protracted meeting in Canton, 
which I did the latter part of Angust. I went on horse- 
back, the first day forty-two miles to AYilliamsport, and 
the next day forty-fonr miles to Brother Rockwell's. The 
second day of this trip I passed through the most ro- 
mantic region I ever beheld. The mountain scenery of 
Switzerland is, without doubt, justly celebrated. I had 
had a panoramic view only of some of this scenery, and, 
if any thing like a correct conception may be obtained 
in this way, then the scenery between Williamsport and 
Canton is fully equal to that of Switzerland. After leav- 
ing Williamsport in a north-westerly direction, for about 
seven miles up Lycoming Creek, which disembogues it- 
self into the west branch of the Susquehanna two miles 
above that place, Ave arrive at a point where the creek 
emerges into the valley from the great Alleghany range. 
Here the south side of the mountain is bold and rugged, 
and the creek presents the appearance of having cut a 
notch from the surface of the high lands of the mountain 
to its base. The course of the stream is pretty direct. 
True, there are many windings, but the curves are of 
short radii. The bottom lands are quite narrow, and a 
narrow wagon road, sometimes on one side and sometimes 
on the other, follows the stream, crossing it twenty-seven 
times in a distance of twenty-five miles. When I first 
went up this creek, the settlements were sparse, the inhab- 
itants living in small houses near the margin of the beauti- 
ful stream, and cultivating little patches of land. In pass- 
ing up the road, the eye was busy with the many objects 
of interest and beauty. On the right hand and on the 
left of the narrow road, the precipitous mountains 
tower up until they seem almost to touch the clouds; 
their broad sides covered densely with evergreen trees 
of the pine genus, and cut here and there by little 



124 BEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

streams dashing down over stony and rocky beds, and 
strongly and closely hemmed into their channels by the 
millions of tangled laurel bushes, with their always ver- 
dant leaves. Some of these streams, in places, form 
most beautiful cascades, the rapid descent of the water 
over the rough bed lashing it into foam, until it is 
nearly white as snow. Xow and then the larger streams 
come down through deep gulfs and pour their waters 
into the creek; lofty peaks rising up on each side of 
them, which seem, from their base, to be capped by the 

clouds of heaven. It is reported of Elder B , a 

Baptist preacher, that he had an appointment to preach 
at the forks of Lycoming Creek, at the house of a 
Mr. Blackwell. He came there the evening before his 
appointment, which was the next day at 11 o'clock. 
Before breakfast, he thought he would take a walk on 
the mountain, and ascended one of the high peaks 
which overlooked the stream below. Here he went to 
work rolling huge stones down the mountain, and be- 
came so much interested and excited in watching and listen- 
ing to the plunging rocks, as they tore their way through 
every obstacle until they bounded into the plain, that he 
quite forgot the lapse of time, and when he returned 
from his walk, had the mortification of learning that his 
congregation had assembled, waited a reasonable time, 
and dispersed Avithout religious service. 

But now to my own travel's history. Emerging from 
this deep cut in the mountains, through which flows Ly- 
coming Creek, about sunset I arrived at Elias Rock- 
well's, forty-four miles from Williamsport, and at an ele- 
vation of sixteen hundred feet above the level of the 
ocean. Brother and Sister Rockwell and their family 
received me "as it becometh saints." He was — and, if 
living, still is — an elder of the congregation of disciples 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PBEACHEB. 125 

at Canton. Next morning we went over to Silas E. 
Shepard's, who resided on the same road one mile north 
of Brother RockwelPs, was introduced to Sister Shepard, 
whom I found to be a kind and amiable lady, and in- 
quired for her husband, who was, as she informed us, in a 
wheat field near by, reaping wheat. We went in search 
of him, and found him in company with two other men 
wielding a sickle. The elder, at that time, weighed about 
one hundred and thirty pounds, and I think w^as about five 
feet seven and a half inches in height. He had on an 
outer garment of tow linen, reaching down to his ankles 
when I was introduced to him, and his easy turn, bland 
manners, intellectual head and classic face at once pre- 
possessed me in his favor. He came to Bradford County 
from Shamokin, Columbia County, as a Baptist preacher, 
and preached at Smithfield and some other places, as well 
as at Canton. Through some means unknown to me, he 
became a reader of the ^' Christian Baptist,^^ which turned 
his attention away from baptistism to an examination and 
study of the apostolic teaching. Soon he became an 
ardent advocate of primitive Christianity and the ancient 
order of things. He was zealously opposed by Elder 
Parsons, a Baptist preacher of some note and distinction 
in the country. The result was the division of the two 
Baptist churches at Smithfield and Canton. The truth, in 
the mind of such a man as S. E. Shepard, and wielded with 
all his masterly power — for his logic and utterance were 
exceedingly clear and forcible — convinced the more intelli- 
gent of the Baptist members to declare in favor of primi- 
tive order and apostolic teaching, so that a respectable 
number in each congregation constituted a congregation 
of disciples of Christ without the unscriptural prefix Bap- 
tist, having Elder Shepard as their minister. 

Next day I commenced my labors at the protracted 



126 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

meeting, which had been appointed with special reference 
to my speaking. I commenced speaking after reading 
the sixth chapter of Romans, the seventeenth and eight- 
eenth verses, of which I made the foundation of three days' 
preaching. After the first day, at each meeting, after 
taking onr seats together. Brother Shepard would whisper 
to me: ^^Now, go on with the form of doctrine. '^ The 
analysis was substantially the following : 

1. The doctrine (teaching). 

2. The form of teaching, or the teaching in regard to 
the form. 

The teaching, we showed, antedates all Roman Catho- 
lic teaching, and all Protestant teaching as such ; and to 
understand the pure, unmixed teaching of the apostles we 
must go back to the sacred record, Avhich is more than 
1800 years old. I arrange the items thus : 

1. Faith; 2. Repentance; 3. Baptism. 

The results following from these: 

1. Remission of sins. 

2. Gift of the Holy Spirit. 

3. Eternal life, upon the condition of a continuance in 
the apostles' teaching, according to the second part of the 
great commission (Matt, xxviii. 19, 20). It was shown 
that the form is not baptism first ; second, repentance ; 
and third, faith. This was argued at length, and the 
truth elaborated that the order of the items can be none 
other than faith first, repentance second, and baptism 
third. It showed what faith is not, then showed what it is ; 
and the same was shown of repentance and baptism, after 
which the use and abuse of each item was fully developed. 

A protracted meeting then was one which continued two 
or three days; now, a protracted meeting is understood to 
be one that continues until every subject is exhausted, and 
every body satisfied, if not worn out. And this reminds 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 127 

me of a conversation which was reported to me once as 
having occurred between Father Thomas Campbell and 
Elder John Henry. The former was in the habit of 
delivering very long discourses, while the latter was 
noted for his copious quotations from Scripture. It 
happened "on a time^^ that Father Campbell and Brother 
Henry both spoke at the same meeting one evening. 
On the way from the meeting. Brother Campbell re- 
marked: "Well, Brother Henry, I thought you would 
inundate us this evening with Scripture quotations." 

Brother Henry replied that he was in the habit of sus- 
taining his propositions by an abundance of proof. "But, 
Father Campbell," said he, " [ concluded before you were 
through this evening that you were in truth preaching 
/ the everlasting gospel.^ " 

One error was committed at this my first meeting at 
Canton ; that is, no invitation was tendered for the obe- 
dience of faith on the part of the hearers. I left this to 
the resident preacher, and he, as I afterwards learned, was 
not, as yet, in the habit of giving invitations. 

The meeting having closed, and my labors too, for that 
time, I returned to Howard, having received about seven 
dollars for my time and labor. The western part of 
Bradford County was, at that time, scarce of currency. 
Maple-sugar was vastly more abundant than money. It 
was given and taken in exchange for any and every thing, 
and even land was bought and paid for with sugar. He 
was thouofht to be a mean man who did not recj-ard this 
sweet commodity as a legal tender for any debt. It was 
worth six cents per pound, I was informed that some 
persons had made as much as four thousand pounds in 
one sugar ^^bush." 

Before I left Canton, I arranged with Elder Shepard to 
have him come and assist me in holding a meeting at Beech 



128 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

Creek, in Centre County, in October. At the time men- 
tioned, the elder was on hand at the place appointed, which 
was in a grove on Beech Creek flats, precisely where there 
is now a basin for holding saw-logs, which are '^drifted" 
down the stream from the mountains. At this meeting, 
at our request, the elder took the lead. On Lord^s day 
morning, he discoursed from the following words of Paul : 
"When after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by 
wisdom knew not God, it pleased God, through the fool- 
ishness of preaching, to save them that believe. '^ He gave 
a general view of the heathen world prior to, and at the 
time of, the advent of the Messiah ; and, to show the state 
of morals in which they lived who were reputed the most 
civilized and enlightened, alluded to the teachings of the 
wisest of the heathen philosophers and religionists, whose 
waitings have come down to our time. He then con- 
trasted their systems of superstition and gross idolatry with 
the glorious system of Christianity as brought to this sin- 
cursed earth by the Son of God, and preached in every 
corner of the great Roman empire by the illustrious em- 
bassadors of Jesus the Christ. His discourse was heard 
with marked attention, after which I delivered an exhor- 
tation and gave an invitation to obedience. Sixteen per- 
sons responded, whom I immersed in Beech Creek for the 
remission of their sins, on profession of their faith. Two 
of the brethren, Rockwells, and their wives, had come 
down from Bradford with Elder Shepard. This was the 
first time any of them had witnessed the forthwith immer- 
sion of any person who had not given previous evidence 
of their regeneration, and satisfactory proof that they had 
been "soundly converted.'^ To these brethren and sisters, 
the scene of the immersion of these subjects in order to 
the remission of sins, and strictly accordant to apostolic 
teaching, was " a feast of fat things, of wine on the lees. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 129 

well refined/' They often spoke to me afterwards in 
reference to the joy and delight afforded them in attend- 
ing this meeting. This was the first time that I had any 
assistance in the proclamation of the Word of God in my 
new field of labor. I was greatly pleased with the clear 
and lucid style, and sound, logical manner in which 
Brother Shepard declared the counsel of God to the peo- 
ple. His is no frothy declamation and empty sound, that 
is wafted away into thin air, leaving nothing for the 
mind. Nay, verily, his discourses are good sense, scrip- 
tural matter and logically arranged, — not like the eva- 
nescent glare of a meteor is the light he sheds upon a 
subject he discusses; but calm, clear and steady, it is 
more like the light of a fixed star. Not long after he 
assisted me in holding this meeting, he returned to Brad- 
ford County to resume his labors there, and I to the work 
at other points in Centre County. 

While speaking of Elder Shepard, I may as well say a 
few things here, as anywhere else, in regard to a debate 
he had with a Presbyterian preacher, on the subjects and 
mode of Christian baptism. The discussion occurred in 
Troy, Bradford County, Pennsylvania. The opponent of 
Elder Shepard was Rev. Harrower, a Scotchman, I 
believe ; at any rate, he had a very perceptible Scotch 
brogue. He was, no doubt, a man of considerable edu- 
cation, but was quite untrammeled with that Christian 
courtesy which should characterize those who assume to 
preach the gospel and teach others. This was made quite 
manifest by an occurrence which took place at the open- 
ing of the discussion. Some parties had taken considera- 
ble pains to erect a suitable platform for the accommoda- 
tion of the disputants. When the hour for the debate to 
open arrived, a large audience was assembled in a com- 
modious hall, when Mr. Harrower utterly refused a place 



130 BEMINISGENCES AND INCIDENTS 

on the platform with Brother Shepard, preferring to stand 
on a chair when he spoke, and that at the opposite end of 
the hall. 

Mr. Harrower's matter was nearly all written out ; so 
that, when it came his time to speak, he read from manu- 
script. Toward evening, on the second day of the debate, 
the old gentleman began to show signs of decided weari- 
ness. His position as challenger to the discussion became 
any thing but a pleasant one. It was plainly to be seen, 
that the telling blows of Brother Shepard, as he wielded 
the mighty claymore of truth in a most masterly manner, 
were telling with heavy effect upon his opponent ; and 
the latter, doubtless observing, by the countenances of 
members of his own church, that his cause was suffering 
severely, thought best to close the discussion, which he 
did in a most adroit and skillful manner. He got upon 
his chair once more, and addressed the president for the 
last time during the discussion, as follows: "Mr. Prasi- 
dent, the gentleman has complimented me a number of 
times, since this discussion began, as a man of laming; 
but, if Avtiat he says of my arguments be true, I am any 
thing but a lamed man. He says they are a tissue of 
sophistry from beginning to end. 'No^y, Mr. Prasident, 
I am willing to submit my manuscript to any competent 
theological seminary, that they may judge of the truth of 
the matter, as well as the accuracy of the arrangement. 
If I were to stand here and argue for seven years, Mr. 
Prasident, I should be unable to convince the gentleman ; 
therefore, Mr. Prasident, I abandon the field and claim 
the victory. ^^ And so ended the debate. 

" He that fights and runs away 
May live to fight another day; 
But he that is in battle slain 
Can never hope to fight again." " 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 131 



CHAPTEE yi. 

An account of a New Testament — Second visit to Bradford County — Met 
E. S. Hubble— Went out to the State of New York— Met J. J. Moss 
for the first time — Anti-preaching brethren treated us coldly — Learned 
better afterwards — D. G. Mitchell made me a visit. 

Disciples being the more added to the newly consti- 
tuted congregations along the Bald Eagle valley, the sec- 
tarian clergy became more and more alarmed, and utterly 
reckless in tlieir sayings. I was looked upon as a nui- 
sance which ought to be abated, with law or without. 
The clerical opponents of the ancient gospel were princi- 
pally those of the Methodist order. One day a gentle- 
man — a stranger to me and a stranger in the country — 
called at my house and told me that he had been in- 
formed at Beech Creek that a preacher by my name, 
living in Howard, had a New Testament, and that he ex- 
pressed his disbelief of the charge, but it was reiterated 
with such earnestness, that he had called to see me in 
regard to the matter. He then asked me if I had a New 
Testament. ^^ Yes,'' said I; ^^ and an old one too." "I 
.would like to see the neti^ one,'' said he. " I did not 
think you had one." I produced a copy of the common 
version of the New Testament, and after looking well at 
the outside of it, he opened out the title page and read 
audibly, ^' The New Testament of our Lord and Saviour 
Jesus Christ: translated out of the original Greek; and 
with the former translations diligently compared and re- 
vised." 



132 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

" Oh," said lie, ^^this is just a common testament. They 
told me down at Beech Creek that you had made a new 
testament." I replied that taking the word testament in 
the sense of a will, I had a right to make one ; any man 
had this right, and he might also have it printed if he saw 
fit. "This book," said I, "is not properly styled when 
called the New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
Christ. The book is really composed of writings of 
Evangelists and Apostles of Christ. The new and ever- 
lasting covenant or testament, made with all the world 
by our Heavenly Father, and sealed by the blood of the 
Son of God, is described and set out in this book, which 
is very erroneously called by the name you have just read 
on its title page." He was sharp and quick-witted, and 
appreciated the points. Thanking me kindly for the in- 
formation, he bid me adieu. 

This is a single fact in illustration of how little infor- 
mation is imparted to the masses by the preaching and 
teaching of the Protestant clergy, as they are called, who 
have the keeping of their consciences. These preachers, 
having commenced the war against the ancient gospel, and 
keeping up a sort of guerrilla fight, never appearing openly, 
but attacking wherever they could covertly, I deemed it 
my duty and privilege to take bold and decided ground, 
which we knew to be antagonistic to the popular teaching 
of the Protestant sects in regard to all the cardinal prin- 
ciples of the gospel of our salvation. Wherever I went 
to fill my appointments, I affirmed the following proposi- 
tions : The Protestant popular preaching and teaching is 
erroneous in regard to saving faith, erroneous on repent- 
ance, erroneous on baptism, erroneous on prayer, erro- 
neous on the operation of the Holy Spirit; that while 
there are thousands of honest, devoted, and pious people 
among the sects, the errors in their system prevent their 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 133 

enjoyment of the knowledge of the remission of sins, and 
the unwavering hope of a blissful immortality. In order 
to place before the minds of the people in a clear light 
the apostolic teaching, I was in the habit of presenting, 
elaborating, and enforcing the truth contained in Ephe- 
sians iv. 1-6. To this end I carefully prepared a dis- 
course, which will be found in substance in Part II of 
this volume. Sermon No. II, which I proclaimed and 
elaborated wherever I went, sometimes varying it as to 
illustrations, comparisons, etc., as times, places, and hear- 
ers seemed to require, but carefully presenting the sub- 
stance. 

In August, 1834, I again went up to Bradford County, 
and assisted Brother S. E. Shepard to hold a protracted 
meeting. The elder saw me hitching my horse a short 
distance from the meeting-house, and came out and met 
me. After the ordinary salutations, he said : " There is 
a preacher in the house you have never met. He is a 
little singular, and I thought I would apprize you before- 
hand that you may know how to manage when you meet 
him. He is a fine classical scholar, and frequently deliv- 
ers an excellent discourse, but sometimes he goes off on a 
long tangent.'^ Upon inquiring who he was, I learned 
that his name was Ebenezer S. Hubbel. When I asked 
whether or not he was a disciple. Brother Shepard re- 
plied : ^^He believes and preaches all that we do, and a 
good deal more. It is the more that I thought it necessary 
to speak to you about." 

We held the protracted meeting at Alba with good re- 
sults, after which we went on to Troy, in the same county, 
where we held one meeting, and then started for the 
State of New York, our party consisting of S. E. Shepard, 
E. S. Hubbel, John Cummings, Esquire Barnes, and my- 
self; and our destination being some points Avhere there 



134 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

were churches in Cayuga and Wayne Counties, N. Y. We 
went by way of Newtown (Elmira), Spencer, Ithica, and 
Auburn, stopping in the latter place Avith Brother Mott. 
He was one of the keepers of the State Prison located at 
that place, and through his agency we visited the prison, 
and took a look at the convicts. There were at that time 
six hundred and sixty-six men and twenty-eight women 
incarcerated there. The men were stationed round the 
wall in different shops, all busy at work, without being 
permitted to speak to each other. Some were coopers, 
some clock-makers, others shoemakers, and indeed nearly 
all the trades were represented, and seemingly by good 
tradesmen. We were informed that the work done there 
yielded a revenue to the State, after deducting all expenses 
of maintaining the prison. We saw here many fine faces 
and intellectual looking heads — -just as fi.ne and as intelli- 
gent, to appearance, as would be found among that num- 
ber of men anywhere There were those there who, 
before their imprisonment, belonged to nearly all the pro- 
fessions. Artists, lawyers, physicians, and preachers, I was 
told, were among the number. It was a sad thing to me 
to see so many fine-looking fellows deprived of their per- 
sonal liberty as a punishment for crime. In the women's 
department, there was the hardest kind of cases. A 
maiden lady of some thirty-four or five years superin- 
tended this department. She kept the convicts at work, 
sewing and knitting from six to six o'clock, and then con- 
ducted each to a narrow cell for the night. I noticed that 
in the men's cells there was a bed, a Bible, and hymn 
book in each. 

From Auburn we went to Throopsville, where we made 
the acquaintance of Brethren Doctors Waldo and Wait, 
and many others ; but these were distinguished for intelli- 
gence and zeal. Here I remained and conducted a meet- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 135 

ing for a few days and evenings, Brother Shepard mean- 
time preaching at Auburn and Clarksville. From here 
we journeyed on to Cato. From Cato I went to 
AYayne County, preached a few discourses and returned to 
Ira, Cayuga County, where we held a protracted meeting. 
Here I met for the first time Elder J. J. Moss, a man of 
wonderfully acute logical powers, and Avell versed in the 
Scriptures. He, Shepard, and myself protracted a meet- 
ing here. In daylight we held the meetings at Brother 
Barnes\ At night we would sally out into different school- 
houses, and return to headquarters next day. We had a 
good meeting. 

I may mention here that we found in this town a num- 
ber of influential men who were decidedly opposed to 
preaching and preachers in their views of the effort to 
restore primitive Christianity. They had been Baptists, 
and in getting away from Babylon they ran past Jerusa- 
lem. They were so opposed to clergymen that they were 
favorable to no kind of preaching except such as could 
be done by the eldership of each particular church, and 
were sanguine that the people of the world would come 
in to hear at their Lord^s-day meetings, become con- 
verted, and so the church would be kept replenished. 
They were like burned children that dread the fire. 
They had experienced the tyranny of the clergy, and 
were determined to ignore every thing looking in that 
direction. But as experience is the great teacher of ex- 
pediency, learning their mistake in this matter, they 
changed their views, and became liberal supporters of 
preaching and preachers. This change is indicative of 
their honesty and purity of purpose and aim. Being 
" preachers," we received some treatment that they would 
be ashamed to offer at the present day. Some of them, 



136 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

I learn, have, years ago, gone over the Jordan. " They 
rest from their labors, and their works do follow them.'' 

After a tour of about six weeks, I returned to Howard, 
and resumed my labors in the valley. I found winter 
coming on, and I had a horse to keep, which was indis- 
pensable to me in the sort of campaign in which I was 
engaged, and was under the neces'sity of procuring some 
fodder for him. I was the owner of a silver watch, which 
had once had a double silver case, but the outer case 
having been lost, its place was supplied by a case of cop- 
per. This watch, which, notwithstanding its homely- 
exterior, had been a faithful time-keeper, and filled a 
useful place to me, I felt I could spare better than the 
services of my noble horse, and so I traded it to Simon 
Lingle for a ton of hay, which was delivered for the use 
of Pompey, this being the name of as faithful and good a 
horse as ever served man. He was my companion in five 
campaigns, and never once did he fail to perform well his 
share of the labor of spreading the gospel. I finally sold 
him for eighty-five dollars, when I could have had ninety 
for him the same day, preferriu':^ to loose five dollars that 
so noble an animal might have a good master. 

But there is more to be told about the copper-cased 
watch. A few days after I had parted with it, as above 
related, Paul Lingle called at my house to see me. He 
was the father of Simon Lingle arid of six other grown 
sons, and two not yet grown, and of four grown daugh- 
ters. He was a large and venerable man, and as I learned 
by a long acquaintance with him afterward, his heart was 
as large as his person. Soon after his arrival, he pulled out 
the watch and asked me if I knew it. I replied that I 
did, and that 1 had traded it to his son a few days before. 

"Take it,'' said he, "put it in your pocket, and keep 
it. I make you a present of it. The next thing you will 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 137 

be compelled to sell your horse, and soon, in this ^vay, 
we will be deprived of your services as a preacher, and 
this we do not want/^ 

At that time he Avas not a member of the church of 
Christ, but became one that winter, we having to cut 
through thick ice in order to his immersion one cold day 
in the month of January. He proved true to Christ and 
the cause, and died in a good old age, in the winter of 
1855, and was gathered to his people. The affair of the 
watcli was not the only one in which his nobleness of soul 
and kindness of heart were manifested during our rela- 
tions with each other. Many a time afterward the strug- 
gling preacher was made an object of his generosity. I 
hope to meet him in the mansions of the blessed. 

In the year 1835, being at Salona, I was informed by 
two of the brethren there, that David Minser, whom I 
had immersed a few weeks before, at " Bald Eagle 
bridge,'' had knocked a man down for using slanderous 
and abusive language against me. ^^That same man," 

said they, "whom Bro. M knocked down, declares that 

he will shoot you if you immerse his wife.'' They ear- 
nestly advised me not to immerse her, as he was a wicked, 
bad man, and there was no telling what he might do. 
I inquired if they thought he Avas an assassin, and would 
lie in ambush to take my life. They thought he would 
not do that, but more probably would attack me in some 
public place and abuse me; possibly whip me. I replied 
to this, "If that is the character of the man, I do not fear 
him. I was not a coward before I became a Christian, 
and I am not one since. If he smite me on the right 
clicek, I should turn to him the left. At all events, if 
his wife desires me to immerse her, I shall do so." 

Th? huly spoken of — the wife of this man — was a mem- 
ber of the Presbyterian church, had numerous family 
12 



138 BEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

connections who were w^ealthy and influential, and all of 
the "Blue-stocking^' persuasion. She came to my house 
a few wrecks after I received the above warning, w'ith the 
request that I should immerse her, which I did in the 
w^aters of Marsh Creek. She became a member of the 
Beech Creek congregation, and remained one to the time 
of her death, w^hich occurred but a few^ years ago. She 
was near eighty years old when she died. I attended 
her funeral from her own house, and with the consent of 
her liusband, who still survived her. For more than a 
quarter of a century he opposed her, sometimes forcibly 
carrying her back to the house in his arms after she had 
started to meeting. During all this long period, I met 
him frequently every year, and always greeted him 
politely and kindly, and never once did he return my 
salutation. So, after the lapse of twenty-five years, I met 
him again and passed him without speaking, nor did he 
speak to me. His daughter afterwards informed me that 
he had complained to his wife that he had met me on the 
road and I did not speak to him. This seemed a rather 
curious complaint to make against me after I had for so 
many years met him so often each year, and spoken to 
him, perhaps, thousands of times without a sign of recog- 
nition on his part; but he yielded after all, aud had no 
hard thing further to say of me. 

In the spring of this year (1835), my brother, David 
G. Mitchell, came from Ohio to make me a visit. He 
was then in his twentv-fourth vear, and had beg^un to 
speak publicly on the glorious theme of human redemp- 
tion. He remained in the Bald Eagle valley until the 
following spring, engaging in teaching a school during 
the winter. He has the honor of being; the first teacher 
who first thorouo^hlv tauo-ht arithmetic and grammar in 
that locality. This is before the law creating a common- 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER 139 

school system was enacted in Pennsylvania. I never met 
a man whom I thought had clearer, quicker and stronger 
perceptive faculties than he. His logical powers were very 
great, and his sarcasm withering and blighting. Many 
an opponent has felt the force of these powers, and quailed 
beneath them. He had a number of public discussions, 
on different theological questions. He is generally right 
on every question. His perfect integrity, love of truth 
for truth's sake, and his almost unparalleled independence 
of mind and thought, enabled him to choose the right 
side of every mooted question. 

He left us, for a time, in Center County, Pa., in the 
spring of 1836, and via Bradford County, Pa., passed into 
the State of Kew York, as far as to Sackett's Harbor, 
preaching the gospel w^herever he could find opportunity. 
In Jefferson County, New York, he went to see an old 
disciple, whose name was on the back of every " Millennial 
Harbinger •' as an agent for that periodical. Here he 
thought he should meet with sympathy, and encourage- 
ment to continue faithful in the good work of proclaiming 
the pure gospel of Christ to sinners. He had an appointment 
in the vicinity where this old brother resided, and preached 
to his entire satisfaction and that of his family, some of 
vrhom were disciples, especially one of his sons named 
Elisha. An effort was made to hire the young preacher 
for six months as a missionary through that part of 
the Empire State. The old gentleman said to his son 
Elisha : 

" ' Lisha, the Lord has sent this young man to be our mis- 
sionary, and we must hire him. How much will you 
give, 'Lisha, to hire the young man as our missionary?'' 
"Three dollars," was the response. "No, no, 'Lisha," 
said the father, "that is too much for you; you are to 
young a man to give that much. You must remember 



140 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

that it is a very dri/ time with us just noAV in money mat- 
ters/' 

Such was the encouragement received, in a pecuniary 
point of view, by a young pioneer in the eiFort to restore 
primitive Christianity. David G. returned to us in the 
summer, remained a few weeks, and then went to our 
father's, who at that time resided in Meigs County, Ohio. 
He went through on horse-back, a distance of about four 
hundred miles, in eight days, on a very rough trotting 
horse. He is still living and well; was married to Sister 
Elizabeth Bell, in Knox County, Ohio, where he settled 
and now resides, and preaches the gospel in all the circum- 
jacent region. I am his senior three years and a half. 

In February, 1836, I made the journey on horse-back 
from my home to Minerva, Stark County, Ohio. The 
snow was about two feet deep, and the weather intensely 
cold. I preached in a number of places both going and 
returning. Sowing the good seed of the kingdom was 
my constant employment, wherever I could find opportu- 
nity to do so. When I left home, I had two little boys, 
Ira C, and Origen, the elder nearly three years, the 
younger six months old. After I reached Minerva, and 
while there, it was impressed on my mind that one of the 
children was dead. From whence this impression came, or 
how it was produced, I knew not, nor have I known since. 
I simply state the fact that I was so impressed. So firmly 
did this impression fasten itself upon me that I was 
scarcely ever rid of it. When within twenty-five miles 
of home, and stopping with a cousin of my wife, I was 
told by her that our little Origen was dead and buried 
a number of weeks before. So strong had the impression 
been upon me that one of the children was dead that it 
did not at all surprise me to learn the fact that I Avould 
see mv babe no more on earth. 



IN THE LIFE OF A FIOyEER PUEACHEB. 141 

On my return, this time, from Ohio, I crossed the Ohio 
River at Wellsburg on the ice, in the latter end of March, 
and passing through Washington, Brownsville, Union- 
to^Yn and Connelsville, Pa., stopped at Mount Pleasant, 
in Westmoreland County, Pa., and was kindly entertained 
by Judge Lobengier and fomily. The following conver- 
sation was related to me as having once occurred between 
the Judge and a noted Doctor E , of Western Penn- 
sylvania, a popular Baptist preacher, and a bitter opponent 
of what he called ^^ Campbellism.'^ The doctor w^as so- 
journing at the judge's, not having any idea that the 
latter had the least sympathy for the views held by those 

whom Dr. E called ^^ Campbellites.'^ As innocently 

as a child, he said to the judge: ^^ Judge, I don^t know 
what we are to do with the ^ CamphellitesJ I believe 
in my heart they will take the country unless they are 
checked. What can we do to stop their progress?'^ 

The judge was a sedate, candid old gentleman, and 
though by no means wanting in civility and courtesy, was 
not loquacious nor fussy. Said he : " Well, doctor, I 
believe they are making considerable progress, and I do 
not know how we can manage to stop them until we first 
get the Bible away from them." This was a poser. The 
doctor learned by this reply w^here the judge's S3^mpa- 
thies were in regard to religious people, and changed the 
theme of conversation. 

From Mount Pleasant I went to Somerset, the county 
seat of Somerset County, intending to stop over night with 
Brother Chauncey Forward. But when I arrived I found 
that his wife lay at the point of death, and before morn- 
ing she died. I w^as directed from Brother Forward's to 
stop at Brother Charles Ogle's, which I did. He was the 
son of old General Ogle, and. the same who figured some 
in Congress afterward. He was the Demosthenes of his 



142 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

judicial district, an attorney of eminent abilities, and a 
very fine looking man. He died comparatively young, 
leaving an estimable widow to mourn liis departure, to- 
gether with a host of other friends and relatives. He was 
much devoted to primitive Christianity, and a member of 
the Church of Christ in Somerset. 

Brother Chauncey Forward was a distinguished member 
of the Somerset bar. No man stood higher as a man of 
probity and integrity. He was a brother of Walter For- 
ward, of Pittsburgh, who was at one time a member of 
the cabinet, at Washington City, D. C. But Brother F. 
was not only distinguished as a lawyer, he was also an 
eminent preacher of the gospel of peace, and a pioneer in 
the restoration of the nineteenth century. In various 
parts of Somerset County, his logic and eloquence con- 
vinced and charmed the people of the rural districts, as 
from time to time he laid the claims of the Son of God 
and the gospel of His grace before them. He was suc- 
cessfid 35 an evangelist, and no doubt many will bless God 
in the day of eternity that they had listened to his plead- 
ino^s for men to be reconciled to God, 

CD 

Some of the members of the Somerset church were of 
the opinion that the calling of a lawyer and that of a 
preacher were incompatible in the same person. A meet- 
ing was called to consider the question. After a full hear- 
ing, pro and eon, on the issue, it was unanimously, as I 
was told, decided that there was not the slightest incom- 
patibility in the tAvo callings or professions being com- 
bined. Nothing in the oath of an attorney or counselor-at- 
law that was not in accord with the highest moral prin- 
ciples; that if any attorney did or said any thing that was 
not consistent with the Christian religion, he did not do 
it by virtue of his profession as a lawyer, but against it. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 143 

This was, I think, a righteous and just verdict of the 
church at Somerset. 

Brother Forward died in the strength of manhood, and 
in the midst of his usefulness, being about forty-four years 
of age. He was a noble spirit, and a genial, warm- 
hearted Christian, but excessively modest. Mysterious 
are the ways of Providence. 

The church at Somerset was organized at the beginning 
of the "restoration^^ movement. Father Thomas Camp- 
bell and his son Alexander often preached there. Old 
Father Grafton and his lady were members of the first 
organization. The old gentleman told me once, when I 
was holding a protracted meeting with this church, that 
when a boy he carried the United States Mail from Phila- 
delphia to Pittsburgh on horseback. What a difference 
between then and now ! 

From Somerset, I passed on via Halliday's cove, Tuck- 
ahoe valley, and Half-moon, where, as before stated, I 
found that our little family circle had been entered by the 
fell destroyer, and our youngest born taken away — my 
beloved companion experiencing the pangs of that grief, 
which only a mother has ever known or can know, while 
I was separated from h,er by many weary leagues. But 
being a Christian mother, her grief was somewhat modi- 
fied by the promises of Him who said of little children 
"Of such is the kingdom of heaven. '^ I once more en- 
tered upon my labors in the old field and in the regions 
lying adjacent, and continued until the last day of August 
of that year, 1836. 



144 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 



CHAPTER YII. 

Tour to Ohio via Ebensburg, Pittsburgh, Minerva — Visit mv parents- 
Went from Meigs County to Davton — Back to Jamestown — Bro. M. 
Winans relating his conversion — Preaching of Bro. Kaines, and Wi- 
nans' baptism — Debate vrith Mr. McClain — ]^ovel close of the debate. 

On the morning of August 31, 1836, whicli, by the 
way^ was quite a frosty morning, my wife, our little boy 
Ira, and L set out in a barouche on a journey. This ve- 
hicle had seen service, and had parted with the top it once 
had, and was the same I had purchased from Elder Will- 
iam Schooley, of Columbiana County, Ohio, when I was 
about starting East with my sister wife. The elder had 
made it for his own use. We made no stop, except to stay 
over night, until we reached Ebensburg, on top of the 
Alleghany Mountains, where we stopped Avith Brother 
John Lloyd. In this town there was a congregation of 
disciples. They were mostly Welsh, and a majority of 
them had been Baptists. Among their number were two 
very good preachers, as I was informed. I heard them 
both preach while we conducted a protracted meeting with 
them. One of them, William Davis, I know was a good 
preacher. The other, Brother Tibbit, I could not under- 
stand, as he spoke in the Welsh language. These two 
brethren were held in high esteem for their many virtues 
and labors of love. They were ardent in their labors to 
restore primitive Christianity. We had a good meeting, 
the brethren were edified; and the citizens instructed as to 
the primitive order. 



IN TEE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 145 

Leaving Ebensburg, we passed through Pittsburgh, 
Beaver, and many other towns, and halted for a time at 
Minerva, again making the house of our beloved uncle 
and brother, John Whitacre, our home. Old incidents, 
scenes, and facts of various kinds were recalled to mind, 
discussed and talked over. Leaving this place, we pur- 
sued our journey by the way of Canton, Massillon, Woos- 
ter, Mt. Vernon, Zanesville, Putnam, Deavertown, Sunday 
Creek, and Athens, and arrived at my father's in safety 
and in good health. Of course we stopped at many of the 
aforementioned places, and proclaimed the gospel of the 
Son of God. 

Again I was in the society of my father and mother, 
and some of my sisters and brothers still lingered at the 
old home. Here, again meeting with my brother David, 
he and I agreed to make a tour further west and preach 
the word. We went as far as Fairfield and Dayton, 
holding meetings in different places ; and, at the latter 
point, I made the acquaintance of Elder Love H. Jami- 
son. He has been abundant in toils and labors, in priva- 
tions and trials, for the cause of Christ, very many of 
which are doubtless to be requited when the Lord, the 
righteous Judge, shall give the crown. Like nearly all 
the preachers of that period. Brother Jamison labored 
from pure love of the good cause, having little hope of 
earthly reward. He was something of a poet, and one of 
his hymns, which appears in the ^'Christian Hymn- 
Book," beginning "Night with ebon pinion,'^ would be 
sufficient of itself to give him immortality. 

Returning to Jamestown, we stopped with Brother 
Matthias Winans. I was very glad to meet him and 
make his personal acquaintance, having frequently read 
from his pen short, pithy, logical, common-sense arti- 
cles published in the " Millennial Harbinger, ^^ " Primitive 
13 



146 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

Christian/^ and other periodicals. He gave us a brief 
relation of his religious experience, which was sabstan- 
tially as follows : He was brought up in the State of Ken- 
tucky, studied medicine, and became a practitioner. He 
also became a confirmed infidel, and occasionally em- 
ployed his powerful pen in writing short articles against 
Christianity, which were published in the secular news- 
papei*s. The prevailing sentiments, and the sayings and 
doings of the popular religionists in the vicinit}^ where 
he resided, tended to confirm him in his infidelity. The 
great religious excitement in Kentucky had not entirely 
subsided, and meetings were still held in the name of 
Christianity, at which most extraordinary manifestations 
were had. Many persons became frantic, in some cata- 
lepsy was produced, while others were barking, swooning, 
shouting and jerking. The doctor was prepared to ac- 
count in his own mind for all such phenomena on natural 
principles. " Some,^' said he, ^^ acted hypocritically, feign- 
ing to be influenced by supernatural causes ; others were 
nervously affected, but there was no unnatural influence 
exerted upon any of them.^' He was at one of their 
meetings on an occasion of more than usual excitement, 
and walked, as he commonly did, Avith a staff. Insert- 
ing a sharp pin in the lower end of his cane, which he 
allowed to protrude half an inch or so, he walked about 
the grounds (the meeting was in the open air) in search 
of phenomena. He had not searched long until he found 
a case. A very large negro was lying flat upon his back, 
helpless and powerless— ;-stricken down by supernatural 
power, and, of course, arrested by the Spirit in his career 
of sin. Two white men, one upon each side of the negro, 
were upon their knees fervently praying for the deliver- 
ance of their fellow-man from Satan's yoke, and for his 
sound conversion. Having carefully reconnoitered the 



IN TEE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 147 

premises, he came to the conclusion that the black man 
was unquestionably feigning catalepsy, and imposing upon 
his sincere and anxious white friends. He concluded to 
apply the test he had already prepared for this species of 
deception. Passing close to the praying and prayed for, 
by an adroit movement of the hand in Avhich he carried 
the staff, he succeeded in inserting the protruding pin far 
enough into the skin of the negro to reach the nerves of 
sensation. With a roar and a spring like an enraged bull, 
he sprang from his recumbent position, dashed one of his 
praying friends in one direction and the other in another, 
and fled from the place, to their great discomfi.ture. Such 
things as this confirmed the doctor in his skepticism. In 
a short time after this', he removed from Kentucky to 
Jamestown, Ohio, where he engaged in the active practice 
of his profession. At one period, he had not been to hear 
preaching for about seven years, when he was urged by a 
neighbor, whom he highly respected, to go out and hear 
Brother Aylette Raines, who was preaching in the town. 
Out of regard for his friend, more than for any other 
motive, he went and heard the discourse, was highly 
pleased with the manner, and still more with the matter 
of the sermon, and invited the preacher to go home with 
him, which he did. Here he proposed to Brother 
Raines the knotty questions with whieli, in former years, 
he had been accustomed to entangle and puzzle the 
preachers with whom he came in contact, and was as- 
tonished to find his meshes broken as Samson broke 
the cords of the Philistines. All his questions were ex- 
hausted, and there had been no hesitation and no diffi- 
culty about the answers. He said to me that he was 
much ashamed of one thing. From hearing the popu- 
lar preaching of the day, he had imbibed the opinion 
that many objectionable things were in the Bible which 



148 REMimSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

were actually not there. When he introduced these^ and 
Brother Raines taught him his mistake, he was no little 
chagrined at his exhibition of ignorance. 

An appointment was left by Elder Raines for a meeting 
several weeks from that time. An impression had been 
made on the strong and honest mind of the doctor by 
the discourse and the private conversation Avhich followed 
it, from which he found it impossible to free himself. 
Shutting himself up in a private room he took the Bible, 
and ^^Campbell and Owen's Debate,^' and prayerfully and 
candidly for the first time went to work to examine the 
claims of Christianity to a divine origin. He devoted 
himself to this work with such intensity that his family 
became alarmed, fearing that he was losing his mind, if it 
was not already shattered. He informed them that he 
was perfectly sane, and fully understood what he was 
about. 

At length the time appointed for Brother Raines to 
preach came, and with it came the preacher to fill his 
appointment. As was usual with him, he wielded the 
sword of the Spirit with great power and skill, piercing 
the hearts of the king's enemies. The investigations of 
the doctor had resulted in his thorough conviction that 
the Bible was not the work of mere men, and that what 
John Locke once said of it was the truth : " It has God 
for its author, truth for its matter, and eternal life for its 
object." While this meeting was progressing (for it con- 
tinued some days), conversations between Brother Raines 
and the doctor were frequent, but they were no longer 
on the question of the divine origin of Christianity. ^| 
This was already settled, and the only remaining difficulty ^ij 
was in relation to the design of baptism. As the result 
of these conversations, and of his own investigations, 
Brother "Winans became satisfied that baptism was for the 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 149 

remission of sins, and that the passage in Acts ii. 38, 
could have no other meaning than ^^in order to.^' To 
read the Greek, eis aphesin amartioon — '' because of," — to his 
mind was an unwarranted perversion of the meaning of 
the phrase. Once satisfied on this question, he was not 
the man to hesitate in his course. At this second meet- 
ing, he came forward among others, made the confession 
of the Saviour, and desired to be baptized. 

A large crowd assembled along the banks of a stream 
to witness the baptism, and before going down into the 
water the doctor made, in substance, the following re- 
marks : 

"Friends and neighbors: You are all acquainted with 
me. You are all aware that I have not been a member 
of any professing Christian church ; but, on the contrary, 
that I have been an unbeliever in the divinity of the 
Christian religion. You see me now a candidate for bap- 
tism. The suddenness of the change on my part, per- 
haps requires from me a word of explanation. Having 
candidly examined the claims of Christianity, as taught 
on the pages of the Xew Testament, by a careful induc- 
tion of its proofs touching its divine origin, I am fully 
convinced that God is its author. 

"I am here an unpardoned sinner. Christ says: ^He 
that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved ; but he 
that believeth not, shall be damned.' This I believe. 
The reason w^hy I am to be baptized is, that I desire to be 
saved from the guilt of sin. I am a poor debtor. On 
one side of the page it is all written ' debtor,' and on the 
other side it is all blank — not one entry to balance the 
heavy account on the debtor side. I have nothing to 
offer or give that can be placed to my credit. But the 
gracious Heavenly Father, on account of Christ's dying 
for sinners, offers pardon to those who will accept the 



150 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

terms. I believe that God will forgive my sins in bap- 
tism, and enter a credit in full against the debtor side of 
the account. The credit will be : ^ I forgive all.' I 
shall arise to walk in newness of life.'' 

It is said that the effect upon the congregation was 
powerful and salutary. Immediately after the remarks, 
the doctor went into the water and was immersed for the 
remission of sins. 

While we were stopping with him at Jamestown, the 
brethren of the ^' Christian order " closed a protracted 
meeting which they held in the nieeting-house belonging 
to the disciples. All denominations were permitted to 
occupy this house when not occupied by the disciples, 
wdth the proviso that they should have the right to reply 
to any thing taught which was believed by them to be 
unwarranted by the teaching of Christ and the apostles. 
This proviso was a pretty effectual lock to the door of the 
house. Few desired to occupy on these conditions. On 
this occasion, the house was occupied for a number of 
days, the exercises being conducted by Enoch Harvey and 
a Mr. McClain, of the " Christian order." At the close 
of their meeting, Brother Winans arose and reminded the 
preachers of the conditions upon which they had occupied 
the house. Brother Harvey wished to know whether 
any thing had been said by them during the protracted 
moetino: which was not in accordance with the sacred 
Scriptures ; and in reply was informed that in the judg- 
ment of the disciples there were many things taught which 
were not in accordance with apostolic preaching, and many 
things done which did not accord with apostolic practice, 
alluding to the "mourner's bench" operation. 

"Do you wish to have a debate with us?" inquired 
Brother Harvey. 

" We do," replied Brother Winans; " Ave are anxious that 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 151 

tlie people should be taught what to do to be saved, as the 
apostles taught/^ 

^^ Then, Brother McClain, we shall be compelled to 
gratify our friends," said he ; " let us make out a propo- 
sition, settle preliminaries, and we will spend two days in 
discussion/^ 

Brother Winans then wrote out and read this proposi- 
tion : ^^ Failhj repentance and baptism precede the remis- 
sion of sins under the gospel dispensation;'^ and said, ^^ We 
affirm this proposition." Brother McClain replied, ^^We 
take the negative." So the issue was at once formed, 
and arrangements were immediately completed to com- 
mence the discussion the next morning at nine o'clock. 

At nine next morning, I opened the debate. But 
before we commenced, Eider McClain proposed to take 
the sense of the audience at the close. To this we con- 
sented, on condition that w^e take the sense at the begin- 
ning also, that we might ascertain whether any one's mind 
was changed by the argument; for we were well aware 
Ihat tliere was a large majority on the negative of the 
proposition when we began. The elder would not agree 
to this, and so it was decided not to take a vote at either 
the beginning or close of the debate. 

Our first half hour was spent in proving that as to faith 
and repentance there was no difference between the views 
of the gentleman and our own; that he regarded these as 
necessarily preceding the remission of sins as much as we ; 
and therefore as to two-thirds of the proposition we could 
have no debate. 

In reply, the elder labored to prove the necessity of 
faith and repentance in order to the remission of sins. 

We complained of him in repty, on the ground that he, 
though on the negative side of the proposition, had ex- 
hausted his half hour in showing that at least two-thirds of 



152 BE^flNISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

what we affirmed was susceptible of very clear proof. Then, 
with many thanks for his assistance on our side, we ad- 
duced some additional evidence to show that fiaith and 
repentance do precede remission of sins. 

In his next speech, he got fairly up to his work, and 
labored to show that sins are remitted on the ground that 
the sinner believes and truly repents; this excludes bap- 
tism. Therefore, as a whole, the proposition is not true, 
and the affirmative, so far as baptism is concerned, can not 
be sustained. 

We were now fairly brought to the real issue, with 
faith and repentance eliminated from the question, and 
we proceeded to prove it as though it read ^^ baptism 
precedes remission of sins under the Christian dispensa- 
tion.'^ We showed when, how, and by whom remission of 
sins was first preached in the name of Christ, and which 
was to be offered to all nations, and cited Luke xxiv. 
46, 47 and Acts ii. 38. 

The elder then reiterated the substance of his former 
speech, and tried to show that on the day of pentecost 
they were commanded to be baptized because their sins 
tvere pardoned. 

We then took up the passage in Acts ii. 38, and exam- 
ined it critically in the following manner: The remis- 
sion of sins is an end to be gained. There are certain 
things commanded to be done in order to the attainment 
of that end. These are repentance and baptism. If we 
strike out baptism, it would read ^^ repent for the remis- 
sion of sins." Would any person understand this to mean 
that because your sins are pardoned you must, or ought 
to repent ? Certainly with the popular view that repent- 
ance is sorrow for sin, no one would suppose that it is com- 
manded because sins are pardoned, and this view of re- 
pentance is the one entertained by our worthy opponent. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 153 

It being conceded that if baptism were not in the sentence, 
it would be understood by every body to be equivalent to, 
in order to ; and repentance and baptism being both placed 
in precisely the same relation to the remission of sins, and 
being inseparably connected by the conjunction and, how 
dare any one separate what God has joined together? 
Xot only is it irrelevant and irreligious to attempt to do 
so, but it is unphilosophical and absurd. Suppose that in 
mechanics a certain weight is to be raised by means of a 
lever. Having secured a lever, we want a fulcrum and a 
weight to be placed on the long arm of the lever. By 
mathematical calculation we ascertain the weight re- 
quired, say four hundred pounds. Who would reason 
against mathematical science, and say, we can just as well 
accomplish the work with three hundred pounds, and 
therefore we will dispense with one hundred? Nobody 
thus reasons, because all perceive in a moment that the 
logic of such reasoning fails. God^s word, spoken by the 
Holy Spirit by the mouth of Peter, is as true and certain 
as the science of mathematics. Again, suppose you are ten 
feet from the entrance into a room ; can you enter that 
room by going six feet and stopping there? It can not be 
done. You must go the ten feet. AYe offered other illus- 
trations, too numerous to mention here, all to the same 
point. 

My opponent, in answer to this, affirmed that Peter was 
in error on the day of Pentecost, in consequence of his 
Jewish prejudice; but that he was clear on the question at 
the house of Cornelius. He then proceeded to expatiate 
on the text in Acts x, making an effort to show that Peter 
proposed other conditions of salvation on this occasion 
than those commanded on the day of Pentecost, as re- 
corded in Acts ii. In short, that Peter was versus Peter, 
as there was a discrepancy in the two cases. 



154 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

We then took up the tenth of Acts, and showed that 
there was not the slightest discrepancy between Peter on 
Pentecost and Peter at the house of Cornelius. The fol- 
lowing analysis was then made : " It is admitted that 
Luke wrote the tenth of Acts. In that chapter he reports 
some things which were spoken by Peter and some things 
which Avere not spoken by Peter. To ascertain just what 
Peter said, nothing more, nothing less, we must separate 
what Luke reports him to have said from the things which 
he has not reported as said by Peter. In this view, which 
is the only correct one, what did Peter say ? Let us read.'^ 
We then read, beginning with the 34th verse of Acts x, 
and concluding at the end of the 43d verse Then 'omit- 
ting verses 44, 45, and 46 which contain a statement of an 
occurrence, and are no part of what Peter said, we read the 
47th and 4(Sth verses : " Can any man forbid water that 
these should not be baptized, which have received the 
Holy Ghost as well as we? And he commanded them to be 
baptized in the name of the Lord.'^ Connect this with 
Acts ii. 38, ^^ Then said Peter, Repent, and be baptized every 
one of you in the name of Jesus Christ.^^ We observe here 
it was in the name, etc. Now turning to Luke xxiv. 47, 
we read : " And that repentance and remission of sins 
should be preached in his name among all nations, begin- 
ning at Jerusalem.^^ ¥/e observe again that it says in the 
name — remission was to be granted in his name, and in no 
other. ^' In the name '^ they were commanded to be bap- 
tized, as well as to repent, in the beginning, at Jerusalem. 
They were commanded to be baptized in the same name, 
when the middle wall of partition was fully broken down 
and the Gentiles brought in, that there might be one fold 
and one Shepherd. 

The elder then closed by saying that he presumed a 
longer continuance of the debate would not be profitable. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 155 

He declined to say any thing more, and we, of course, did 
not urge a man to say more who acknowledged himself at 
issue with the Apostle Peter, and, of course, with the Holy 
Spirit too, for Peter spoke as the Spirit gave him utterance. 

Of course the foregoing is but a synopsis of what was 
said on the occasion, but is substantially correct in every 
particular. 

The debate being over, we took our departure early 
next morning, having an appointment to preach in the 
evening forty miles east of Jamestown. So we bade the 
good family and Brother Winans adieu, and have never 
had the pleasure since of seeing any of them. Brother 
Winans, years ago, was called away from the scenes and 
turmoils, as well as the joys of this life. 

In passing eastward, on one occasion, we came to a 
brook, where a gentleman was watering his horse, which 
was a beautiful animal, and finely caparisoned. The 
man had for an outer covering a large camlet cloak, and 
thrown across his saddle were a well-filled pair of sad- 
dle-bags. As soon as I came near him, I guessed, from 
his port and bearing and the peculiar twang and smack 
of his lips when he said, ^^ How do you do, sir?*^ that 
he was a clergyman. I thought I could not ])e mistaken 
as to the genus, and would have pronounced him of 
the Methodist Episcopal species, but in this last I was at 
fault. 

"That is a fine horse you ride," said I. 

Said he, " Yes, sir, this is a fine horse, a good traveler 
and of excellent bottom. It is necessary for me to have 
a good horse." 

"You are a preacher, are you not?" inquired I. 

"Yes, sir," said he, "and my circuit is about six hun- 
dred miles in circumference, and I make it once every 
four weeks." 



156 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

" To what order of religious people do you belong ? " 
I asked. 

"I am/^ said he, ^^a presiding elder in the denomina- 
tion known as United Brethren in Christ." 

"How long since this order of people came into exist- 
ence ? " continued I. 

"About fifty years since/^ was his reply. 

"Wherein/^ said I, "do they differ from a certain 
people we read of in the New Testament known as dis- 
ciples of Christ, and who were first called Christians at 
Antioch ? " 

"Oh, sir," he answered, "they do not differ at all from 
them." 

"Then," I said, "if they differ not, they are the same 
order, and why do you say they have existed fifty years 
only?" 

" AYell, sir, by tracing our order back for about fifty 
years, we find Ave merge in the Moravians, and they are 
doubtless three hundred years old," he replied. 

"But," I persisted, "there is still an interval of fifteen 
hundred years between the Moravians, as you fix their 
rise, and the disciples, who were first called Christians at 
Antioch." 

We had now come to where the road forked, and he 
took the left hand road, while we kept the right. How 
much easier and more sensible to call Bible things by 
Bible names and be a Christian at once. 

So passing on east, preaching at different points, we 
arrived safely at father's, in Rutland, Meigs County, from 
whence we sat out a few weeks previous. After stopping 
and recruiting a few days, I went to Chester, then the 
county seat of Meigs County. Falling in with my old 
friend Elder James E. Gaston, he and I went on a 
preaching tour to Parkersburg, Ya., by way of "Long 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 157 

Bottom/^ on the Ohio side of the Ohio River. We 
preaclied at the house of Mr. Buffington, and also in a 
school-house on the bottom, and held forth in Parkers- 
burg for some time. Here I saw for the first and last 
time our Brother Elisha Mitchell, whose name I have 
frequently seen in public prints, and who is, as I have 
been told by those who ought to know, an able, worthy 
and efficient preacher of the gospel, which he has been 
for many years. Brother Gaston and I returned by the 
same route, filling appointments which we had left as we 
went up. I parted from him at Brother Torrence's, and 
went twelve miles further, and was again at father's, 
where my wife and boy w^ere staying on a visit during 
the winter. In all of the places where we preached, we 
had good hearings and large audiences, and in some 
places where we protracted our meetings, we witnessed 
prompt obedience to the gospel. In other places, w^e did 
not look for immediate results, but knew we were sow- 
ing the seed of the Kingdom, and expected some one to 
reap where we had sown. ^^ One sows and another reaps.'^ 



158 RE^flNISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 



CHAPTER YIII. 

Eeturn from Ohio to Centre Co., Pa. — Removed to Beech Creek — The 
system of common-schools inaugurated — Labored in the cause of the 
schools for a number of years — Death of my mother-in-law — Ee- 
moved to the old homestead where my wife was born and reared — 
Took a clerkship at Harrisburg — Acquaintance with some of the 
members of the Church of God — Remained over a year, and returned 
to my field of labor in Bald Eagle Valley. 

On the last day of March, 1837, I left father's with 
my wife and little boy, and drawn by our noble Pomp in 
the old barouche, now minus the bellows top, started for 
Howard, in Centre County, Pennsylvania. The roads 
were exceedingly muddy and heavy, but knowing by ex- 
perience the nerve, bone and sinew of Pomp, and under 
the guidance of our Father in Heaven, we hoped to 
reach our home in safety. We passed through Athens, 
the seat of justice of Athens County, Ohio, and the seat 
of the Ohio University, stopped several days at Sister 
Lydia Nye's on Sunday Creek, and preached to the peo- 
ple. Passing thence up Sunday Creek through Deaver- 
town, Rehobeth and other villages, we stopped at Moxa- 
hala, (Jonathan's Creek). Here we were completely 
storm-staid, by a continuous fall of snow and rain, 
for several days. Leaving our friends and brethren 
here, we passed on through Zanesville, and being now 
on the ]!^ational turnpike, we kept it as far as Searights, 
in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. Here, turning more 
to the north, we passed through Connelsville, Mount 
Pleasant, Blairsville, Ebensburgh, Hollidaysburg, Water 
Street, Birmingham, Walkerville and Bellefonte, and 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIOXEEB PREACHER. 159 

arrived next day safely at Howard. Stopping in a 
number of places on the way to preach the word, we 
were a little over a month making the voyage through a 
sea of mud. 

In May I removed to Beech Creek, and recommenced 
my labors after an absence of seven months, during 
which time the elders of the respective churches of the 
restoration had edified themselves by a study of the word 
of God, and also edified the congregation by speaking in 
prayers and exhortations, and singing psalms, hymns 
and spiritual songs. I continued here, residing in the 
same hired house, for two years, in each of which I 
taught a term of school at twenty-five dollars per 
month, which was the highest price paid to any one for 
teaching by the board of school directors of that town- 
ship. 

Prior to the administration of the government of the 
commonwealth of Pennsylvania by Joseph Pitner, the 
State had no system of common-school education. Some 
of the governors had urged the Legislature to enact a 
law creating a system of common-schools, especially 
Governor Wolf, who stated in one of his messages to 
the Legislature, that there were forty thousand children 
in the State without means of education. The law in 
fbrce alloAved the county commissioners in each county 
to pay out of the county treasury a sum sufficient for 
the tuition of such children as they knew to be re- 
turned to their office as those whose parents were pecun- 
iarily unable to secure schooling for them. The odium 
attaching to this arrangement prevented thousands of 
poor parents from returning their children on the pau- 
per list to the commissioner's office. Many remained, 
therefore, without any opportunity of going to school 
at all. 



160 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

When a law was at length enacted for a uniform and 
general system of common-schools throughout the State, 
I deemed it my duty, as well as privilege, to lay a help- 
ing hand. The law would have been a dead letter upon 
the statute book if the friends of humanity had not 
given it vitality by going earnestly to work to carry out 
practically its provisions. Many citizens opposed it, and 
used all their influence against it, and these, as a matter 
of course, were the more opulent, who were able to 
educate their own children. Others had already educated 
their children, and some had none to educate. It was 
thought to be unjust to tax them by law to educate the 
poor children of others and their own too. Such, and 
many other objections were urged against the enforce- 
ment of the law, but its friends came up nobly to the 
work and sustained it against all opposition, and I am 
happy to say that among these were many of our wealthy 
citizens, who were anxious to redeem the good old Key- 
stone State from the odium of having, as Governor 
Wolf said, ^^ forty thousand children without means of 
education. ^^ 

I labored in this cause nine or ten years. Preaching 
the gospel, lecturing on common-schools, examining those 
who applied for schools, as to their intellectual and 
moral qualifications for the important work, and often 
serving as an officer under the common-school law, ab- 
sorbed my mind, and taxed my energies, physical and 
mental, for at least a decade. By that time the district 
of Howard put on a more lovable and lovely appearance. 
We had good and true coworkers in the cause of the 
schools, but fierce and embittered foes in the cause of 
primitive Christianity. The few dilapidated school- 
houses remaining were torn down and replaced by new 
and comfortable ones. Many bright countenances of 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 161 

light-hearted lads and lasses gave evidence that they were 
in a civilized country, and that the school law was a 
success. The drunken and incompetent pedagogues 
who had occupied the field shouldered their knapsacks 
and departed, or else sank into themselves and en- 
gaged in employment for which they were qualified, 
with the understanding that their school teaching was a 
huge joke. 

During all these years of 1832 to 1839, I labored in 
word and doctrine principally in Centre County, at Spring 
Creek, Cedar Run, Salona, Bald Eagle Bridge, Beech 
Creek, Marsh Creek and Howard. At the Bald Eagle 
Bridge, Elders Jesse H. Berry and John Marshall made 
profession of the faith of Christ. They have both made 
their mark as preachers of the ancient gospel of God. 
At all these places there were persons who obeyed the 
gospel — the accessions being most constant and numerous 
at Beech Creek, Howard and Bald Eagle Bridge, the 
greatest number at the former place. 

In the spring of 1839, my wife's mother died of paraly- 
sis. I was preaching at Howard on the funeral occasion 
of a young man named Washington Tipton, in the dwell- 
ing-house of his mother. Mother-in-law was in the au- 
dience. While I was speaking, I noticed that she was 
ill. She arose from her seat and faintly articulated the 
word water, I stepped to her assistance, took her in my 
arms, and laid her on a bed. Erom this she was taken 
home in a carriage, and placed in her own bed; from 
which, in one week, she was taken and placed in a coffin, 
and carried to the grave. She was born and brought up 
a Quaker, and never belonged to any other denomination. 
She was as inoffensive and as amiable a woman as ever 
lived, and left no enemy in the world. 

On the 30th of April, 1839, I moved to the old home- 
14 



162 RE3fINISCENCJES AND INCIDENTS 

stead where she had died^ and took charge of the farm 
and the family she had left behind. The farm belonged 
to the heirs of James Packer, my wife's father, who died 
when she was in her third year. Here I labored for four 
years, making a full hand on the farm, and preaching on 
Lord's days at Salona^ Beech Creek, Bald Eagle Bridge 
and Howard. I preached twice each Lord's day, and 
frequently in the evenings of week days. 

About this time, there was appointed to the Belle- t 
fonte circuit, as it was named by the Methodist Episcopal 
Church, a man named Mills. He was sometimes called 
"Little Mills," to distinguish him from another Method- 
ist preacher of the same name, who had also been on 
this circuit, and was a much larger man physically, at any 
rate. Mr. Mills took a survey of the field included in 
his circuit, and doubtless thought that the interests of 
Methodism demanded the complete extermination of what 
he called " Campbellism," which had possessed itself of a 
fair portion of his field of labor. In order to make sure 
work of this undertaking, he, w^itli the assistance of a very 
w^orthy Presbyterian minister, Mr. Linn, of Bellefonte, 
made out a discourse of over three hours in length, and 
read it all round the circuit. I replied to him three 
times — at Salona, Howard and Beech Creek. We gave 
notice each time that w^e were going to reply in the even- 
ing, with the request that he would attend and rej)ly ^ bat 
he did not see fit to accept the invitation. 

Mr. Mills' course of argumentation against immersion 
was a very learned (?) criticism on the Greek particles, 
then a tirade of abuse of Alexander Campbell. Fifteen 
minutes of his discourse were occupied in abuse of Camp- 
bell for leaving out of the "Living Oracles" the twenty- 
second verse of the tv/entieth chapter of Matthew. He 
said Alexander Campbell pretended to publish Matthew 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER FBEACIIEr.. 163 

as translated by George Campbell, of Scotland, and 
characterized this as a false representation. He and 
Rev. Linn had examined the original work of George 
Campbell, and found that he had not left this verse out. 
" Xow/^ said he, " vrhy did Alexander Campbell leave 
it out? Because he could not translate the word in that 
passage by immerse, and make sense, therefore he had 
to expunge it, and alter the word of God to carry a point. 
Who would do this but an infidel? The man who would 
do this, deserves to be every-where denounced as an infidel 
and to receive an infideFs punishment ! ^^ His criticisms 
on the Greek particles apo, eis and en were very clear (?) 
and refreshing (?). Of apo he said it has but one mean- 
ing always and in every place where it occurs in the 
New Testament, and that meaning is from. He cited 
numerous passages to prove the correctness of this affir- 
mation. In regard to en, he said it means in and with; 
and eis often means near to, at or by, not far off. These 
commonplace and stale criticisms he repeated and elab- 
orated at great length, and closed by denouncing immer- 
sion as an indecent practice, especially for females in the 
presence of the other sex. He was pretty well round 
the circuit when he read the discourse at Howard ; and, 
at its close, eight members of the Methodist Church (I 
think I am right in the number) demanded immersion at 
his hands, and informed him that if he refused they would 
go where they could be immersed. Eeader, would you 
imagine that a ^^ called-and-sent " clergyman w^ould be 
ready to practice what he stigmatized as "indecent and 
heathenish ^^ in order to keep these persons in his church? 
Mr. Mills immersed them that same day, but never after- 
wards repeated that discourse to my knowledge. He had 
found an argument which even he could appreciate, and 
he never attempted a reply. 



164 UEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

I replied to his denunciations of Alexander Campbell 
on Matt. XX. 22, by reading what Adam Clarke said about 
that verse, which was as follows : 

" ^ And to he baptized with the baptism that I ain bap- 
tized,^ etc. This clause, in this and the next verse, is 
w^anting in B. D. L., (two others, 7 more in verse 23) Cop- 
tic, Sahidic, Ethiopic, Mr. Wheelock's Persic, Vulgate, 
Saxon, and all the Attala except two. Grotius, Mill and 
Bengel think it should be omitted, and Griesbach has left 
it out of the text in both his editions. It is omitted by 
Origen, Epiphanius, Hilary, Jerome, Ambrose and Juveneus. 
According to the rule laid down by critics, to apj^reciate a 
false or true reading, this clause can not be considered as 
forming a part of the sacred text.^^ 

Having read this from Clarke's Commentary, I showed 
that the bitter and ungentlemanly denunciations against 
Mr. Campbell applied with equal force to Clarke, Gries- 
bach, and all the ancient fathers and authorities cited By 
Clarke. We then showed that Alexander Campbell pub- 
lished the New Testament Scriptures as translated by 
George Campbell, James Macknight and Philip Dodd- 
ridge, with various emendations ; that in the appendix to 
the work he had printed the passages for w^hich he had 
substituted an emendation, and that every passage omitted 
had been so omitted by authority of Griesbach 's Greek 
text. The identical text that Adam Clarke himself used, 
and which he recommended every young man to use w^ho 
would study the New Testament in the original. 

To his criticism on the Greek word ajjo, we replied by 
admitting that from was its primary and usual meaning. 
But he had most unmercifully denounced Mr. Campbell 
for translating Acts viii. 35 — ^^ Began from the same 
Scripture. '^ " Why,'' said he, ^' did Campbell translate the 
passage //-o??! instead of atf I will tell you. He wanted 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 165 

to get away from the subject on which the eunuch was 
reading, and get into the water. He would have found in 
the Scripture which the eunuch was reading something 
about sprinJding; but that w^ould not answer his end of 
getting into the water, and therefore he translates it from, 
and not at, the same Scripture." We showed that any one 
who understands the Greek alphabet could see that apo is 
the w^ord in the passage, and we then read Mr. Wesley's 
translation as follow^s : ^^ He began /rom the same Scrip- 
ture." We then referred to the learned criticism of Mr. 
Mills on apo. Having the gentleman himself as authority, 
Mr. Wesley and every body else, under the reason given 
for Mr. Campbell's translation, must be anxious to get 
away from sprinkling into the water. 

We give this specimen of logic, criticism, and argumen- 
tation against the ancient gospel, to show the strength of 
the opposition ; for it was currently reported that he w^as 
a learned man, said to have been educated for a Roman 
Catholic priest. No marvel that his members overruled 
him at Howard, and compelled him to " get away from 
sprinkling," and get them "down into the water." 

The results of the thorough investigation which the 
subject of baptism at this time received in that locality, can 
hardly be measured, for many who never before had their 
attention specially called to it, were led to consider it care- 
fully, and for years the fruits of that effort were, from 
time to time, making themselves apparent. 

I continued my labors uninterruptedly in this region, my 
appointments following each other in regular routine, and 
nothing occurring which I can now recollect worthy of 
note until, in the spring of 1843, when, for a time, the 
scene and the character of my labors were changed. 

Having labored day and night, in word and teaching, 
principally among those who were poor in this world's 



166 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

goods, and having a family to support and educate, I found 
myself compelled to resort to some secular business for a 
livelihood. My wife's brother, William F. Packer, having 
been appointed Auditor-general of the State, offered me a 
clerkship in his department, with a salary of nine hundred 
dollars a year, which, under the circumstances, I felt con- 
strained to accept. I went to Harrisburg, in February, 
1843, and entered upon the duties expected of me. The 
office was kept open six hours a day, which left me eight- 
een hours as my ow^n. I devoted all of these hours which 
I well could to the study of law, reading carefully Black- 
stone's Commentaries, Kent's Commentaries, and several 
other elementary works on law, intending to prepare my- 
self for admission to the bar. I had done much preaching, 
and received but very little in the way of support, having 
maintained myself and family by hard toil — mostly severe, 
physical labor. I thought to combine the practice of law 
with the preaching of the gospel, and was encouraged to 
hope for success in both callings by the example of Bro. 
Forward, of Somerset, Pa., of whom I have spoken at 
length elsewhere in this volume. 

I may here add, that although I prepared myself, by 
diligent study, for admission to the bar, I never applied for 
admission, and consequently never practiced that profes- 
sion, though my studies gave me much valuable informa- 
tion, which has served me to good purpose in more ways 
than one. 

While at Harrisburg, I frequently attended meetings at 
the " Bethel ; " a church edifice owned and occupied by a 
religious body calling themselves " The Church of God,'' 
and generally known by others as ^' Y/inebrennarians." 
Joseph Thomas was, at this time, their pastor, and with him 
I formed a familiar and pleasant acquaintance. 

On one occasion, I went out two miles from tOAvn to a 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER 167 

beautiful grove where these people were holding a camp- 
meeting. It was a delightful Sunday evening ; the meet- 
ing was being held in a beautiful white oak grove, mostly 
composed of large and majestic trees, from the branches of 
which a sufficient number of lanterns were suspended to 
light up most brilliantly the entire camp-ground. The 
strong artificial light, flashing through the dense, green 
foliage, presented a lovely sight. As it was Sunday night, 
and the weather fine, an immense crowd had assembled 
when I came upon the ground. I was immediately ac- 
costed by Brother Thomas, who met me as soon as I 
reached the place, and urged by him to preach on the oc- 
casion. Said he: ^^ You must preach for us to-night; we 
have all preached and labored till we are worn out, and 
we are so glad you have come ; why did you not come 
sooner ? ^^ 

I replied that I had been quite busy, and could not 
find time to come until Sunday evening. ^' But,^^ said I, 
" I must decline your kind invitation to preach to-night, 
on the ground that I can not fraternize with you in your 
mourner's-bench operation. I have been informed that 
you are conducting your meeting on that system, and be- 
lieving it to be an unscriptural and most injurious insti- 
tution, I can have no sympathy with you in it.^^ 

Said he : " Brother Mitchell, you will preach for us to- 
night. We shall ask you to preach nothing but the 
gospel of Christ. If you do that, we will receive every 
word, and then attend to the mourner's-bench part of the 
proceedings ourselves. We will not ask, nor expect, you to 
participate with us in that, seeing that you do not fra- 
ternize with us in the employment of such means for con- 
version. 

This kind and very liberal offer quite won me over, 
and I tjonsented to preach. I read the first part of PauFs 



168 EEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

letter to the Romans, and founded my remarks on the 
sixteenth verse of that chapter : " For I am not ashamed 
of the gospel of Christ ; for it is the power of God unto 
salvation to every one that believeth." I never preached 
more clearly in my life that faith, repentance and baptism 
are appointed of God for the remission of past sins. 
After I was through, a Brother McCartney followed with 
a warm exhortation, and invited mourners to the altar of 
prayer. Crowds came forward and knelt at a bench or 
two, which W'Cre placed directly in front of the stand ; 
and then commenced the scene usual on such occasions — 
preachers, exhorters, members and '^mourners" all unit- 
ing in songs, prayers, shouts, groans, wailings and tears, 
in a determined effort, apparently, to excite the sympathy 
of God in behalf of poor sinners, for whom he had given 
his Son to die. I can never witness such a scene without 
feeling the deepest pain ; for I am not only excited to 
sympathy for the poor deluded ones who are seeking a 
Saviour, and have not learned how" to find him, but I am 
carried back in imagination to the gloomy years of my 
own life, when I struggled through the midnight dark- 
ness of Methodist theology, and had crowded into a short 
period of my youth the agonies of a life-time. 

Leaving this painful and most unapostolic scene be- 
hind me, I got into an omnibus, and made my way again 
to the city and my lodgings. 

I may here add that in all my associations with the 
leaders of this sect which calls itself the "Church of 
God^^ — and they were intimate and frequent during my 
stay in Harrisbnrg, I several times filling the appoint- 
ments of John Winebrenner, and twice preaching for him 
w^hen he was present — I was never able to get up an issue 
with any one of them. At all times, when I talked with 
them in regard to Christianity, they would indorse heartily 



•« 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 169 

the views I set forth, and yet go straight forward in the 
practice of things utterly opposed to what I taught and 
believed to be the gospel of Jesus Christ. On my first 
acquaintance with them, I indulged strong hopes that they 
could be brought fully into the great movement for the 
restoration of Christianity in its purity; but there gradu- 
ally came over me an impression, which to this day I 
have not been able so shake oif, that some men w^ould 
rather be leaders in a system of error, than to have an 
humble position among those who were striving for the 
truth. John Winebrenner could not have shone so con- 
spicuously in a galaxy which had in it some stars of the 
first magnitude, for he was not a great man, but he might 
have had the satisfaction of knowing that such rays as he 
was capable of, w^ere reflected from the Sun of Eighteous- 
ness. 

Having spent about fifteen months at the seat of gov- 
ernment of the Keystone State, I had an opportunity of 
becoming acquainted with the leading men who were at 
that time connected with the civil government of the 
State — governors, legislators, judges of courts, members 
of cabinets, and hosts of tricksters who resorted to the 
capital to advocate or oppose measures for their individual 
private interests. Many of those I met were distinguished 
then, many have ^von earthly honors and rewards since, 
and most of them, in the lapse of thirty years, have gone 
to their final account. With none of them would I have 
exchanged, nor would I now exchange, my humble posi- 
tion and poverty, with my privilege of proclaiming to sin- 
ners the gospel of the grace of God, for all the wealth 
and earthly laurels which the most successful political 
management can win from the hands and hearts of men. 
In looking back now over these years, and tracing out the 
life and death of those who were in the full career of po- 
15 



170 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

litical success, I thank God that I envied none of them, 
nor desired to share with them the prize for which they 
ran. With a busy political world about me^ my heart 
twined more and more to my old field of gospel labor, and 
the faithful little congregations v/hich, through much trib- 
ulation, had grown up, and stood side by side with me, now 
calling loudly for leadership against the thronging foes. 

The brotherhood of disciples in Centre and Clinton 
counties now promised me five hundred dollars a year for 
my support, if I would give up my position and salary at 
Harrisburg, and again enter the field. This I consented 
to do, and turning away from my clerkship, I was soon 
again busily engaged in my old field of labor in the Bald 
Eagle "Valley. But I never received more than three 
hundred dollars of the five hundred promised me, and for 
many years I thought myself fortunate in getting so large 
a proportion as that of what was from year to year 
subscribed. This was owing, in a great measure, to 
the pernicious system of finance then practiced. At 
the beginning of a year, a subscription paper would 
circulate among the brethren, and all were asked to put 
down what they felt able and Avilling to pay. It very 
often happened that those who were poorer than myself 
would subscribe large amounts, no doubt honestly mean- 
ing to pay them. In this way a stipulated salary was 
summed up on paper, and the subscriptions were finally 
handed over to me for collection. Those who felt so dis- 
posed, came and paid me in the course of the year, and 
those who did not come of their own motion, scarcely 
ever were called upon at all. It is a bad system, and 
my advice to preachers is to make their contracts with 
the members of the church who are in every way re- 
sponsible for what they promise, and hold them individ- 
ually to a fullfillment of their pledge, leaving to them the 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 171 

soliciting of subscriptions, and the collection of the 
amounts subscribed. This will be found to work better 
for the church, for the preacher, and for all parties con- 
cerned. 

I soon found that the current expenses of niy house- 
hold could not be met without some addition to what I 
was receiving for preaching, and having had my atten- 
tion called to land surveying, I resolved to qualify myself 
for that 'work. I accordingly prooured and studied a 
standard work on surveying, and no sooner announced 
myself ready for the prractical part of the work, than I 
received a call for my services. My brother-in-law, John 
P. Packer, had a piece of land to run off and measure. 
He desired me to commence at a particular corner, run a- 
number of bearings and distances, and close, from a pre- 
scribed point, by calculation. He asked me the question, 
whether I could calculate the bearing and distance of the 
closing line, for it ran through dense woods, and across 
hills and ravines, so that it was impossible to close it in 
any other way. I answered him: " If I can not do that, 
I am not yet a surveyor.^' A few days afterward, he pre- 
sented me with a compass worth sixty dollars, and I did 
the work he had in hand to his entire satisfaction, as well 
as my own. He remarked, when he gave me the compass, 
that he would have a good deal of work for me, and this 
I subsequently found to be true. 

From this beginning the calls to survey soon became 
numerous, so that I had enough of this kind of labor to 
perform. About this time, the wild timber lands in 
the north and west part of Centre County began to 
b€ looked after. New England lumbermen began to 
turn their attention to the immense pine forests in that 
part of Pennsylvania, and by their indomitable energy 
and ingenuity in devising ways and means to get the 



172 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

timber from the gorges and summits of the Alleghany 
Mountains into market, soon demonstrated, to the slower 
moving and less cunning natives, that forest crowned 
mountain land was vastly more valuable than the farms 
M^hich had been won from the wilderness. 

The lands in this region had been granted by the com- 
monwealth of Pennsylvania to various parties, and lines 
run and marked on the ground from the year 1769 to 
1794. But lying mostly in a mountain wilderness, they 
were considered of little value, and the titles passed from 
hand to hand, being scarcely thought worth holding. 
But now, at about the same time, attention w^as attracted 
to the timber, and to the vast beds of coal upon and 
within these lands, and those who held the titles became 
anxious to have the lines of their tracts sought out and 
freshly marked, as well as to guide their own operations, 
and to prevent others from trespassing upon them. To 
seek lines originally indicated by notching trees with an 
ax in a vast wilderness half a century before, required no 
little labor of itself. But to increase the difficulty, under 
the vicious system of granting lands in Pennsylvania, 
innumerable blunders had been made in the original 
work, so that very frequently the state of things found 
on the ground was entirely different from what was rep- 
resented on the papers procured in the land office. 
This gave rise to much litigation in the courts, and was 
a source of revenue to attorneys- at-law, as well as to 
surveyors. 

To survey these lands became my chief secular employ- 
ment for many years, and furnished me the means for 
supporting my family without removing me from my 
field of gospel labor. I have no doubt that a kind 
Providence directed my footsteps, and led me to the 
selection of this business, when I was sadly harassed 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 173 

between the two duties of preaching the gospel and 
ministering to the necessities of those who rightfully 
looked to me for sustenance. I continued to preach on 
every Lord's day, and frequently through the week when 
not otherwise engaged, while my business furnished me 
plenty of healthful physical exercise, and brought me 
constantly into close contact with nature, in all her 
native grandeur and beauty. I traveled over mount- 
ains, hills and dales, slaked my thirst at the beautiful 
fountains Avhich bubble up from the sides and summits 
of the mountains, as clear as crystal and as pure as a 
dew drop, and, when wearied out with a day's toil, found 
sweet repose on the banks of some mountain brook, with 
fragrant evergreen branches for my bed, and the canopy 
of heaven for a covering. Thoughts and sensations 
thronged upon me, as many a night I lay thus, gazing 
up into the star-gemmed sky, while companions slum- 
bered around me, and the spirit of solitude sobbed in 
the great wilderness, which are indescribable, but which 
seemed to bring me very near to the great God, the 
author of nature. Thus was I constantly furnished with 
food for sentimental thought, as well as for reasoning 
and mathematical deduction. Many illustrations and 
figures which afterwards took position in my sermons 
were wrought out and arranged in the midst of the 
scenes which they were drawn from. The numberless 
varieties of wild flowers, which in summer and autumn 
beautified and perfumed the forest; the winds wailing 
through the branches of trees, whispering in zephyrs 
or raging in tempests, and sometimes the awful grand- 
eur of fierce thunder-storms; the miniature cascades, 
where waters lashed into foam leaped down steep de- 
clivities; the mournful notes of the whippoorwill; the 
prolonged howl of the wolf, or the shrill scream of the 



174 EElIimSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

panther at night, all furnished pleasure or excitement, 
and supplied food for contemplation and reflection. 
Such surroundings, I have no doubt, prepared one of 
my mental and physical constitution better for preach- 
ing than the study of books written by uninspired men 
would have done, amid the artificial and monotonous 
surroundings of the study. 

Coming from the woods after several days' surveying, 
I was released from physical toil, and prepared well to 
quietly sit down and make a map of the field wx)rk, and 
a calculation of the surveys, when necessary, from the 
field notes. This done the study of the Bible was next 
in order, to prepare me to proclaim its truths to men. A 
critical examination of some portion would be made, not 
by making out the skeleton of a sermon, and then finding 
a text to suit the discourse, but by a careful analysis of 
some theme, topic, or argument of some of the divinely 
inspired writers. My inquiries were : What does the 
writer propose to set forth ? What are the propositions ? 
How do the arguments bear upon the persons of whom 
and to whom he writes ? What have these propositions 
and proofs to do with saint and sinner? What with Jew 
and Gentile? How do they apply to us of to-day? I 
never did make out many discourses except by an anal- 
ysis of some portion of Scripture, and have always been 
exceedingly careful and conscientiously scrupulous lest I 
should misrepresent and misapply what God said by the 
pen of inspired men. I have heard many discourses in 
which unwarrantable liberties were taken with the word 
of God. Many discourses have been delivered called 
the gospel of Christ, when an almanac would have been 
a better book from which to select a text than the Bible, 
for then there might not have been any misapplication 
of the sacred word. 



1 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 175 

But to return: liaving deduced a few propositions 
which were obviously contained in the portion of Scrip- 
ture upon which I proposed to speak, I was prepared 
on the Lord's day to meet an audience, state the propo- 
sitions, and elaborate and enforce them, much better than 
I could have done if confined for a whole week, reading 
commentaries and writing out a discourse, or a skeleton 
of one. I never take a single note or sentence into the 
pulpit to look at to assist me in speaking. I have always 
purposely avoided this. I have no doubt they hamper 
the mind, and prevent the speaker from having the ben- 
efit of the inspiration of the hour, which naturally arises 
from the act of speaking, and the influence of the sur- 
roundings of a popular audience. To write a discourse 
and afterwards read it, is one thing, to preach to saint 
and sinner is quite another thing, in my estimation. The 
true preacher of the gospel of the blessed God is greatly 
desirous of accomplishing the object of his preaching, 
which is to save men and women from sin, and shame, 
and guilt, to make good people of bad ones, and to 
make good people better. The genuine preaching of 
the gospel will always put Christy and the means of 
salvation through him, between the speaker and the con- 
gregation. 

I would not make the impression that I approve the 
idea of a preacher of the gospel following some secular 
employment. While the work which I was fortunately led 
into, probably assisted me in my pulpit efforts, the neces- 
sity Avhich drove me to it prevented me from securing 
and wielding that powerful influence which can only be 
got by visiting and laboring from house to house. I have 
no doubt that I might have accomplished immense good 
had I been free to devote myself to pastoral labor, which 
I was never able to accomplish at all. I was compelled 



176 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

often to make a journey of from ten to fifteen miles on 
Lord's day morning, in order to fill an appointment, and 
then make the return trip after preaching, that I might 
be on hand to commence the labors of the week. Thus 
I was prevented from becoming so familiarly acquainted 
with the people of a community in Avhich I preached as 
I ought to have been, and on that account was not able 
to exert the private influence I might have done, and 
could not so well adapt my preaching to the wants of 
the congregation. During my earlier labors in this field, 
this was perhaps unavoidable, for there were none acting 
with me who could contribute to my support. But I 
toiled many years in this way, after a numerous brother- 
hood were about me, who might have easily given me 
such support as I needed, and allowed me to put all my 
time into the work of the gospel. I am glad chat the 
preachers of this generation mostly receive a liberal sup- 
port from those who should support them, whenever they 
prove themselves worthy; and that they are thus free to 
cultivate and develop their talents for private teaching 
and influence, as well as to prepare their minds and 
hearts for public preaching. This is as it should be. 
But when brethren who have grown rich by unremitting 
attention to the things of this world, while pioneer 
preachers were expending equal talent and equal labor 
in an effort to build up churches on the primitive founda- 
tion without earthly reward, ask in wonder why young 
men are not more eflicient in pastoral work, it is well that 
they should sometimes be reminded of the good they 
might have accomplished, by investing, for the preacher's 
support, some of the gold they have hoarded, to be scat- 
tered by other hands when their own are folded under 
the lid of a coffin. 

My following of the compass through trackless wilds. 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 177 

often suggested to me the following of the teachings of 
the word of God through the wilderness of this world, 
and a few times I was strikingly reminded of the impor- 
tance of implicitly following a trustworthy guide, when 
such a one is within reach. 

A Mr. M and I once drove a team of horses to a 

little settlement in the heart of the Alleghany mountains, 
where w^e left them in charge of an inn-keeper, w^hile we 
plunged into the unbroken forest many miles, and com- 
menced a survey of old lines, w^hich we continued for a 
week. The last evening of our stay in the woods, we 
found shelter in a lumberman's cabin, designing to make 
an early start next morning for the place w^here we had 
left our team. We were up at peep of day, snatched a 
hasty meal, and set out on our journey. My companion, 
was, as I knew, an old woodsman, and he confidently 
declared that he could go, by a direct course through the 
wilderness, to our destination. I should have myself re- 
lied entirely upon the compass, for I did not feel that I 
could keep a straight course, even if I should make a 
correct start. But confiding in his skill, I told him to 
lead on and I would follow. The sky was completely 
overcast with clouds, a heavy fog hung in all the goj-ges 
of the mountains, and capped their summits, obscuring 
the face of the sun, and in every respect it was about as 
unfavorable a day to a successful journey in such a 
country, without consulting a compass, as could well be 
imagined. Nevertheless, my confidence in my other 
guide was such that I carefully packed my compass in 
a knapsack, because I could carry it that way most con- 
veniently, and trudged on after my leader. AYe had not 
gone very far when I found myself inclined, involun- 
tarily, to diverge to the right of the direction in which 
he was leading, though for some time neither of us said 



178 REMimSCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

any thing. After I had got some distance from him, I 
broke the silence by inquiring if he did not think he was 
getting too much to the left. ^^ No/^ said he, ^' I am going 
in the right direction;'^ and I overcame my feeling of 
diverging from him, and we journeyed on. At length, 
he seemed to hesitate a little, and finally he stopped, 
consulted a pocket compass, pointed with his hand and 
said, "Yes, this is south. ^^ "Not if your needle is right 
and accurate,'^ said I; "the north end of it points in the 
direction wliich you say is south.^^ "Oh, yes!^^ was his 
reply, "the needle is wrong; these little compasses are 
not to be relied on.'^ My own judgment of the course 
we ought to take corresponded with his, and so we kept 
on for a considerable time longer, when we both became 
convinced that we were completely bewildered and wan- 
dering about in circles. I now unpacked my compass, 
placed it upon the staff, turned the north end of the 
needle in the direction I supposed it would settle, and 
let it down upon the pivot. It revolved rapidly a num- 
ber of times, and finally settled precisely the opposite of 
what I thought it should. North was one hundred and 
eighty degrees from where my feelings would put it, and 
I realized that I was fearfully lost. No one who has not 
had the same experience can appreciate the sensations of 
one thus bewildered. The cardinal points were an entire 
hemisphere from where I supposed they were. I saw 
that the needle traversed well, and I had entire confi- 
dence in what it indicated. I was fully determined to 
be governed by it, but the difiiculty was how to follow 
it, in opposition to my own judgment and feelings. I 
knew that we had not traveled a sufficient length of time 
but that a south-west course would take us to the settle- 
ments, and out of the wilderness. Our provisions were 
entirely exhausted, and we had no prospect of procuring 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 179 

any thing to eat^ until we readied tlie hotel where our 
horses had been left a week before. The morning was 
still cloudy and foggy, and the compass must, of necessity, 
be our only guide. I carefully took the bearing south 
forty-five degrees west, and we again started. But, oh, 
what bewilderment I was in ! nothing but the face of an 
instrument to direct me, and it contradicting all my own 
impulses and feelings ! I ran along in this way for some 
time, and then, every time I started from a station, the 
straight line I was running seemed to take the form of 
an immense curve, and I felt as if walking on the pe- 
riphery of a vast circle. The radius of the circle became 
longer and longer as I advanced, until finally it w^as no 
longer a curve. My feelings corresponded with the facts 
indicated by the compass, and our bewilderment was 
over. We had evidently been wandering for some time 
in vicious circles, and might have continued so to wan- 
der, getting deeper and deeper into the difficulty but for 
the sure guide which Ave consulted and followed. In due 
time, we safely reached the point for which we started, 
and I have no doubt did full justice to the food v/ith 
which we were supplied. 

The guide brought us out, but only as we followed it. 
When my companion consulted his pocket compass, it di- 
rected him correctly, but when he condemned it, and re- 
fused to be guided by it, while we continued to walk 
according to our own judgment, we remained bewildered 
wanderers in the wilderness. When we confessed our 
own weakness and ignorance, and depended on an infalli- 
ble guide, following its dictates perseveringly, we were 
disenthralled from our unpleasant situation, and emerged 
safelv into the neio:hborhood of civilized men. A. bad 
guide is worse than useless. "If the blind lead the blind, 
both will fall into the ditch.'' A good guide is essential 



180 BE3nNISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

where one must walk by faith, but is of consequence only 
when implicitly followed. 

In attempting to follow the original lines of surveys, 
modern surveyors made many blunders, and as they 
usually marked their running by notching trees, their 
lines became the source of new difficulty to those who 
should follow them, and thus interminable confusion 
seemed to prevail throughout the whole region of the 
"wild lands.'' 

I was once making my way into this region, equipped 
with compass, jacob-stafP, knapsack, etc., when I was ac- 
costed by an eccentric old gentleman, who was, withal, 
something of a wag, in about these words : " You are 
going into the woods to make a survey, but I tell you, 
Mr. Mitchell, you may as well turn back, for the woods 
are so full of lines now that you won't be able to get 
through them." ^^Oh," said I, ^^I pay no attention to 
these new lines, they are no source of difficulty to me ; 
for the lines I^im seeking were run in 1794." 

I thought of the ancient gospel, which extended itself 
from the Euphrates to the Tiber, and was the same from 
Babylon to Rome, whether preached by Peter, John, or 
Paul, eighteen hundred years ago; of the great apostasy, 
and of the effi)rts made at reformation, and which were 
still being made, and there seemed to me a striking anal- 
ogy between the work in which I was engaged as a re-pro- 
claimer of the gospel, and that in which I was searching 
out the ancient landmarks and boundaries of lands sur- 
veyed the better part of a century before. 

I have always disliked the word " reformation," as ap- 
plied to the great religious movement to which I have 
given my best energies, and for the success of which I 
have contributed such poor abilities as I could command. 
Sometimes it is said that it matters little what any thing 



m 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PTIEACHER. 181 

is called so that it is right in itself; but the whole 
thought conveyed by this word is utterly wrong as applied 
to our effort. It was well to call the movement of Luther 
a reformation, for such it was, as it originated in an effort 
to reform the Roman Catholic Church ; and the Augsburg 
Confession itself was the best effort of Luther and his 
wisest coadjutors to prove that Lutheranism might prop- 
erly exist in the bosom of the Catholic Church, being 
simply reformatory of its abuses. The efforts made from 
1 time to time since to reform Protestantism are properly 
! called reformations, for such they are, or profess to be. 
I But are not all efforts to reform churches clear admissions 
; on the part of those making the efforts, that the church 
j sought to be reformed is not the ^' Church of the Living 
f God?^^ For as surely as God is perfect, His church can 
j not, without gross irreverence, be thought of as needing 
j reformation. Men may fall far short of the perfect stand- 
ard fixed by Him for His church, and they may need ref- 
ormation in life and manners, but whatever is reformed is 
no part of the church. 

The apostles of Jesus Christ either did or did not es- 
tablish a church of Jesus Christ. If they did not, there 
is no infallible standard by which our obedience to God 
may be determined, since they only, of all men, were in- 
fallibly guided by the Spirit of God, and every man may 
do what is right in his own eyes. But that they did es- 
tablish such a church, is manifest from the fact that it is 
more than once alluded to in their writings as an existing 
institution. (See Eph. i. 22, 23; Col. i. 18; 1 Tim. iii. 
15.) Having on record the things they preached as the 
object of faith, and the things they commanded for obe- 
dience — to study the record, believe and obey what they 
(taught and commanded, is to reproduce among us in 
modern times the very same institution which they set up 



182 BEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

then. If we have this^ it can not be changed for the 
better; unless we consider ourselves qualified to change 
the work of God, and hence all efforts at reformation are 
a confession that the thing to be reformed, whatever else 
it may be, is not the Church of Christ. What we want, 
is to study the writings of inspired men, that we may re- 
store to the world the same institution in faith and prac- 
tice which Paul spoke of as '^The house of God, which is 
the Church of the living God.^^ That many things are 
taught and practiced by modern churches which belonged 
to the primitive church is doubtlessly true; but certainly 
these will not be less imj^ortant or less practiced if a 
church in all respects the same as that existing in the 
days of the apostles can exist now. That men need ref- 
ormation, and may be reformed, is true ; but that the in- 
stitutions of a church founded by divinely inspired men 
can be reformed is a palpable absurdity. 

What we want, then, is not to follow up the lines 
newly run and newly marked out by Martin Luther, or 
John Calvin, or John Wesley, or any other uninspired 
man, however well we maybe led to think of him for his 
goodness and zeal, or however anxiously he may have 
been seeking for the old paths. If we undertake to trace 
out and disentangle the confused and conflicting lines of 
Protestantism or of Catholicism, we shall get confused 
inextricably, and perhaps succeed in setting up a new 
sect. But if we take the Word of God, and know and 
care nothing for any line less than eighteen hundred 
years old, we shall be carried far beyond all these modern 
difficulties to find our place of beginning, and if we find 
occasionally that modern seekers for the old landmarks 
have at times followed the old lines, we may go hand in 
hand with them as far as they continue to do so, without 
danger of diverging with them when they strike out into 



IN THE LIFE OF A PIONEER PREACHER. 183 

the trackless wilderness. If we make only God^s Word 
our compass, and follow its indications, as surely as in- 
spired men carefully marked out the boundaries of the an- 
cient church, we must find and follow the very same lines 
which they originally established. But if we trace out the 
marks of modern and uninspired men, w^e shall find the 
right lines by accident, and the divergent ones by deliber- 
ate design. 

I have at different times, in the pursuance of my calling, 
followed the courses of streams from the bounds of civil- 
ization, through all their meanderings, to where the limpid 
waters first leaped from the bosom of the great mountains, 
and began their journey to the sea. In tracing them thus, 
I have been led to observe that the further they get from 
their sources the more impurities they carry, and some- 
times I have known them to become poisonous tides, 
spreading malaria and death among the children of men. 
At their mountain sources, all the chemists of earth could 
not detect in their sparkling w^aters a trace of impurity, 
and at their mouths, no artificial process could restore 
them to what they had originally been. No human wis- 
dom would think ofprocuring that important element, 
pure water, by a chemical manipulation of a stream which 
has rolled its flood through the filth of a great city; yet 
the humblest dweller in the mountains could stoop and 
quaff, with perfect ease, from the fountain w^here nature 
poured out her crystal gift to all who would come and 
drink. 



184 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 



THE FAITH ONCE DELIVEKED TO THE SAINTS. 

"Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common 
salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that 
ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto 
the saints." — Jude 3. 

The advocates of a restoration of primitive Christianity- 
are not making an eifort to build up a new sect in Chris- 
tendom, nor do they teach for faith or practice any 
peculiar views by which they can be distinguished as a 
denomination, in the popular acceptation of the term. 

The Roman Catholics teach and practice things which 
were not taught by Jesus nor his apostles, and this they 
very frankly acknowledge — seeking to justify their un- 
apostolic teachings and practice on the assumption that 
there exists an unwritten, as well as a written, word of 
God — the second contained in the Scriptures and the first 
consisting of the traditions of the church, both equally 
authoritative. They hold that the church is infallible, 
and that, therefore, any and every thing which may have 
been added, from time to time, by her authority, to the 
things taught by Christ's apostles, is as obligatory and 
binding as the things taught by those whom Christ per- 
sonally chose to be his inspired messengers to a lost world ; 
and, also, that she may change, modify or abolish the ordi- 
nances given by the apostles. In opposition to this as- 
sumption on the part of the Koman Catholic hierarchy, 
the Protestants take the ground that the Scriptures of the 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 185 

Old and Kew Testaments are the only infallible rule of 
faith and practice ; and this position, peculiarly a Protest- 
ant one, is set forth in most of the popular Protestant 
confessions of faith and written creed books. We most 
heartily concur in the proposition. We believe and teach 
that there is no such thing as the unwritten word of God 
at the present day; that it was finished when John wrote 
the amen of the book of Revelations, and that it contains 
all things necessary for faith and practice. 

We agree with the Roman Catholics in many things — 
indeed, in all things which they hold that are plainly 
taught in the sacred Scriptures ; but we repudiate those 
things which they hold by no higher authority than the 
Church of Rome. Of course we can have no controversy 
with them about the things in Y>^hich we agree, but only 
about those things in which we differ. The first Protest- 
ants, or those who opposed the errors of the Roman 
Catholics, w^ere certainly right in their opposition to the 
assumption of the pope, his cardinals and priesthood. 
The great error of Protestantism was in writing out phil- 
osophical opinions of the teachings of the Scriptures, and 
making them authoritative and binding as tests of char- 
acter and rules by which orthodoxy was to be measured ; 
and this is the reason for the existence of the divis- 
ions and subdivisions, sects, parties and denominations 
which so greatly weaken the Protestant world as a bellig- 
erent power in the field against the Roman hierarchy. 
Now we propose to call out the people of God from 
Romans, from all the Protestant sects, and from the 
world, and have a united people that are neither Roman 
Catholics nor Protestants ; which we propose to do, not 
by making a new creed, but by inducing all these classes 
to adopt that one made by Almighty God. 

All written human creeds are mere human opinions 
16 



186 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

combined Avith objects of faith, and the compound in eadri 
is adapted to such minds as may view the philosophy as 
true ; while other minds, rejecting the philosophy and 
accepting the faith, are driven to combine the very same 
faith with a different philosophy, so forming a new creed 
and a new sect. No philosophy, no mere opinions, no 
metaphysical speculation ever did, or ever will, save any 
of Adam^s race. God has not proposed opinions as neces- 
sary to salvation, in time or in eternity. The apostle 
exhorted his brethren to receive one another without 
regard to doubtful disputations — opinions, as rendered 
by Dr. Macknight. An opinion is simply the judgment 
which the mind forms of a proposition, where the evi- 
dence is not so clear as to leave no doubts. This may be 
better understood by examining two other words in con- 
nection with this one. They are knowledge and faith. 
Knowledge is that to which a witness can testify. For 
instance, John saw the city of London, and he knows it 
exists from the evidence of sense. James never saw 
London, but believes it to exist from the testimony of 
others. To John, it is knowledge; to James, faith. Not 
on personal knowledge, nor opinion, has God proposed 
to save men ; but on faith, which is the most universal 
principle upon which human action is based. 

Faith in general, or faith as philologically defined, is 
the mind's perception of the truth of a proposition ad- 
vanced by another person, the truth of which is not 
known by intuition. It is, therefore, in other words, the 
belief of testimony. The testimony is submitted to the 
mind, the mind receives it. The proposition concerning 
which the testimony is given is established by the admis- 
sion or consent of the mind that what is stated is true, 
and this is faith. Paul defines it to be the assurance of 
things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen, — 



CHAR A CTERISTIC DISCO UESES. 187 

observe, the conviction of things not seen. The common 
version has the word evidence instead of conviction, 
which is regarded by scholars as an error, and the term 
conviction is by them regarded as the proper English 
equivalent for the Greek word elegchos, which occurs in 
Hebrews xi. 1. 

But faith in an abstract proposition concerning the 
philosophy of the attributes of the Deity, his decrees, his 
purposes, his ways, has not been proposed by him as an 
essential or an incident of our salvation. God may, or 
he may not, have foreordained whatever comes to pass. 
If he has, it is well ; if he has not, it is well : and, with 
us, this is clearly a matter of opinion, and not of faith ; 
and a man may receive it and be a Christian, or he may 
reject it and still be a Christian, as mere opinions have 
nothing to do with our salvation in time or in eternity. 
Now, all the Roman Catholics, and all in all of the Protest- 
ant sects, believe that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, 
the Son of the living God. This is the object of true, 
saving faith — Jesus is the Anointed of the Father, the 
only Saviour of sinners; and, while the Father of all 
mercies employed prophets and seers to make known his 
will in divers ways and divers times, the most wonderful 
and glorious of all his revelations to the ruined race of 
man he left not to flesh and blood; for, when a vast crowd 
was thronging the Jordan's banks that they might hear the 
preaching of John, God's own voice spoke the words 
which conveyed to mortals the most sublime proposition 
which ever fell upon human ears or sank down into 
human hearts — " This is my beloved Son, in whom I am 
well pleased!" Again was this same truth announced 
by the heavenly Father when Peter, James and John 
stood with Jesus, Moses and Elias upon the holy mount- 
ain: "We have not followed cunningly devised fables, 



'f 



188 BE3nNISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 



^vhen we made known unto you tlie power and coming 5 
of our Lord Jesus Christy but were eye-Avitnesses of his J 
majesty. For lie received from God the Father honor j, 
and glory, when there came such a voice to him from | 
the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I • 
am well pleased. And this voice which came from ; 
heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy ' 
mount'' (2 Peter i. 16-18). ] 

Faith, being the principle of action in the Christian 
system, is put, by a common figure, for the whole system, 
by prefixing the definite article. The principle of admis- 
sion into the kingdom of Christ, or church of the living 
God, being faith, and not flesh, or natural birth, the first 
great principle is emphatically used for the entire system. 
This proposition may be sustained by reference to a few 
passages from Paul, which accord with the one read from 
Jude : '' But they had heard only, that he w^hich perse- 
cuted us in times past, now preacheth the faith which once 
he destroyed'' (Gal. i. 23); ^'i^ow the Spirit speaketh 
expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from 
the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines 
of devils" (1 Tim. iv. 1); "I have fought a good fight, 
I have finished my course, I have kept the faith^' (2 Tim. 
iv. 7). There are other passages of the same import, but 
these are sufficient to establish the proposition. There is 
one other, however, on this point, to w^hich we invite 
especial and marked attention, as conveying an idea of 
great moment in the investigation and comprehension of 
this subject. This passage you may find written by Luke, 
which illustrates the fact, that in this respect, the style of 
the sacred writers is the same — Jude, Paul and Luke all 
concurring in calling it " the faith :^' "And the word of 
God increased; and the number of the disciples multi- 
plied in Jerusalem greatly; and a great company of the 



CHABACTEEISTIC BISCOVBSES. 189 

priests were obedient to the faith '^ (Acts vi. 7). Observe 
the form of expression : ^' They were obedient to the 
faith.'^ They were obedient, not to what their own minds 
might suggest, not to what conscience might dictate to be 
done, not to the ceremonial law — yet they were obedient. 
Let us fix indelibly in our minds the fact that Luke care- 
fully tells us what they did obey ; for, having once settled, 
beyond all possibility of doubt, what men were obedient 
to under the direct, personaL teaching of the apostles, we 
settle forever what men should obey now, in order to the 
enjoyment of what they enjoyed then. I am glad he tells 
us they were '^ obedient to the faith J^ The faith was 
preached by the apostles, and those who would be bene- 
fited by it must necessarily obey it. Paul labored to 
destroy the faith at one period in his life, but Jesus made 
an apostle of him, and sent him to the Gentiles to open 
their eyes and to turn them from darkness to light, from 
the power of Satan unto God, that they might receive 
remission of sins through faith in Christ. Going among 
those to whom he was sent, he preached the faith, kept it 
himself, and finished his course with joy. The faith is 
sometimes called the gospel. The term gospel primarily 
signified good news — glad tidings; and, as the proclama- 
tion of salvation from the guilt and punishment of sin to 
miserable sinners, through the sacrifice of Christ, is in 
truth the most joyful news that ever saluted the ears of 
human beings, it is justly, by way of preeminence, called 
the gospel — the gospel of the grace of God, the gospel of 
your salvation, the gospel of God, the gospel of Christ, 
Christ's gospel. The gospel is equivalent to the faith, 
and is a system to be obeyed. Hence, says Paul to the 
Thessalonians : ^^ You who are troubled rest with us, 
when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with 
his mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on 



190 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of 
our Lord Jesus Christ" (2 Thess. i. 7, 8). 

The faith, therefore, which was once (formerly) deliv- 
ered to the saints, means that w^hich was preached and 
taught by the apostles of the Lord and Saviour, nothing 
more, nothing less. It is the same as that mentioned by 
Peter: ^^This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto 
you, in both which I stir up your pure minds by way 
of remembrance; that you may be mindful of the words 
which were spoken by the holy prophets, and of the com- 
mandments of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour " 
(2 Peter i. 1, 2). All of the faith is contained in the 
sacred writings, and in purity, without any mixture of 
error, is found on the pages of the New Testament Scrip- 
tures; and to these pages we must go to learn it — not to 
learn opinions, metaphysical and philosophical abstrac- 
tions, but to learn what to do to be saved in this world 
from sin, and to be ultimately saved in the eternal king- 
dom. The Poman Catholic teaching has much in it 
that is in ^' the faith, ^^ and it has in it much more, and this 
much more it is which characterizes them and distin- 
guishes them from the primitive Christians; for of course 
they are not distinguished from them by the things in 
which their teaching accords with the faith once delivered 
to the saints. If they believe and practice in some things 
less, and in many things more, than Avere taught by 
Christ's apostles, these are the things, undoubtedly, which 
distinguished them from those who, eighteen centuries 
ago, believed and practiced all that was taught by the 
apostles, and no more, and these things, being their pecu- 
liarities, make them a sect — a denomination. 

The same is true of any of the Protestant denomina- 
tions. Each has a human creed ; each says we take the 
Scriptures as the only infallible rule of faith and practice ; 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. . 191 

but as eacli of these creeds has in it enough to distinguish 
it from every other, if any one is according to the Scrip- 
tures no other one can be, else they could not differ. The 
proper solution of this whole difficulty is simply to admit 
that there is truth and error contained in every one of 
them ; that part which is truth is the teaching of the 
Scriptures transferred to the human creed; that part 
which is error must be human, not divine. ISTow elimi- 
nate all that is not Scripture, and w^e are freed from all 
error ; what is left is indisputably true ; the human creed 
is all gone ; in its place we have a divine one, the word of 
God, and all the sects are merged in one body, contending 
for the faith once delivered to the saints. 

Is it not reasonable, is it not every way proper that 
every professed follower of the Son of God should regard 
himself as included in the exhortation of Jude? Can 
any Christian excuse himself in refusing earnestly to con- 
tend for the faith once delivered to the saints? This 
faith was delivered to the saints long before any pontiif sat 
upon the throne in Rome, claiming to be the earthly head 
of the church, the successor of the apostle Peter, the 
vicegerent of God, and of course, therefore, long before 
any of the human creeds existed, which distinguish the 
different sects among those who are known as Protestants 
against these arrogant assumptions of the Poman Church. 
We must take our position anterior to Poman Catholi- 
cism, necessarily anterior to Protestantism, to find, in its 
purity, the faith referred to by the apostle. One who is 
contending for this faith can be neither a Poman Cath- 
olic nor a Protestant. He can not be the first, because 
no such establishment existed w^hen Jude wrote his let- 
ter as that of which the Pope of Pome is the head ; he 
can not be the second, because a Protestant is properly one 
who protests against the pretensions of the Catholics, and of 



192 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

course no such protest could have been made in Jude's time, 
when no such pretensions had, by any one, been set up. 

The disciples of the present day do not set up any par- 
ticular error as existing in any religious establishment, as 
that against which they will protest. There were sin, and 
error, and crimes of the deepest dye in the time of Jude, 
and the very same are still on earth and among men. 
There were means ordained of God in existence then 
whereby those who had the will might escape the corrup- 
tions which were in the world through lust, and these 
same means are within our reach, and this same escape is 
within our power now. If we will, we may lay hold of 
them, use them, and be saved from sin and its terrible 
consequences. Beyond a doubt, these means are pointed 
out in that system called by inspired men the gospel, or 
the faith. But to search for this system, we must needs go 
to the writings of these inspired men, for in these WTitings 
alone is contained the sum total of all that is required 
with respect to faith and obedience. The disciples, going 
thus beyond all aberrations from the primitive faith to 
a time which antedates, by near four hundred years, the 
establishment of the first human standard of faith and 
practice, finding the primitive faith and Avalking by it, 
can not, with any regard for truth, be said to hold any 
thing that is peculiar which can characterize them as a 
denomination or sect. 

If, as is stated in terms in nearly all the creed books 
of the Protestant sects, the sacred Scriptures furnish an 
infallible rale of faith and practice, we may discard all 
rules made by men, and be guided in our action by the 
very same commandments which were heard and obeyed 
when the Christian religion was first introduced into the 
world. Turning away from all that is modern, and being 
guided solely by the New Testament, we secure, not only 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 193 

a reformation of any sect, or sects, but a restoration of 
primitive, apostolic Christianity. There are many sects 
which declare their reverence for the Bible by affirming 
their confidence in it, but which, nevertheless, show their 
lack of confidence in what it teaches by devising and 
using other and differeot rales in their practice. The 
disciples of Christ w^ould show to all men their confi- 
dence in the word of God by implicit obedience to its 
teachings, and by an unwavering repudiation of all it does 
not teach.; and if our practice can be brought fully to cor- 
respond with this theory, there will, beyond a doubt, be a 
church existing in the world, differing nothing in faith 
and practice from that which existed under the teach- 
ing of the apostles of the Lord Jesus. And those who 
compose this church can not, with any regard to a proper 
use of language, be called a sect, because — 

First — The system established by inspired men, called 
the faith or the gospel, being fully set forth in the sacred 
Scriptures without the omission of any essential and 
without including any non-essential, if studied, practiced 
and earnestly contended for, must give us all that it offers, 
no more and no less; and instead of having part of a 
large w4iole, we can not but have the whole, including all 
its parts. 

Second — The apostles taught that faith is essential to 
salvation — to present and eternal salvation. Our position 
requires that w^e teach the same. 

Third — The apostles taught that repentance is essential. 
So do we. 

Fourth — The apostles taught that the believer who re- 
pents must be baptized. So do we. 

Fifth — The apostles taught that there will be a resur- 
rection of the dead, both of the jusi and of the unjust. 
So do we. 

17 



194 IiE3IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS, 

SixtJi — The apostle taught that there will be a day of 
judgment. So do we. 

Seventh — The apostles taught that there is a hell in fu- 
ture, and a heaven — the one for the wicked, the other for 
the righteous. So do we. 

Eighth — The apostles taught that God will award 
eternal life to those who, by a patient continuance in 
well doing, seek for glory, honor and immortality. So 
do we. 

Ninth — The apostles taught that Christ was made per- 
fect through suffering, and became the author of eternal 
salvation to all w^ho obey him. We teach the same. 

In short, whatever the apostles taught, the disciples 
re-preach and i^-teach. 'We know nothing but what the 
apostles taught as constituting any part of the faith once 
delivered to the saints. Certainly no living man does; 
therefore, the disciples have no peculiarities. All hold 
to and insist upon these things and whatever else was 
taught by the apostles, without raising and teaching 
theories on the philosophy of the things taught by the 
authority of our Lord Jesus Christ. All who believe 
that the Bible is the Book of God must receive its state- 
ments on any question, whether capable of sounding 
their depths or not; and when the statements of fact it 
contains are believed, and the commandments it teaches 
obeyed, all who so believe and obey become simply dis- 
ciples of the Son of God, with all the obligations and glo- 
rious privileges of children of the Most High. 

!Now let us look at this subject in the light of what jias 
been already shown. Faith is one thing, knowledge by 
personal experience another, and opinion still another. 
Thousands of opinions may arise in the minds of the 
multitudes of readers of the Scriptures, but no opinion 
is necessary to salvation, for no opinion has any tiling in 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 195 

it or about it that either saves or damns, whether it is 
received or rejected. It is not so in regard to faith. He 
that believeth not, shall be damned. The great misfor- 
tune is, men have substituted opinions for faith, or, in 
other words, have put opinions on an equality witii faith. 
Opinions are put in the standards as tests of Christian 
character and of orthodoxy, and most of the religious 
wranglings, bickerings and controversies are concerning 
opinions, mere non-essentials, and acknowledged by them- 
selves to be non-essentials. 

The faith once delivered to the saints does not contain a 
single opinion. Faith and obedience are the sum total 
of what the gracious heavenly Father requires of his 
creature man. He submits the propositions to be be- 
lieved, and furnishes adequate testimony to enable us to 
believe. He issues the commands to be obeyed, and has 
given us ability to obey, with the gracious promise accom- 
panying the proclamation that they who believe and obey 
shall enter through the gates into the city. Hear a few 
sayings on this point : 

'^Not every one that sayeth unto me Lord, Lord, shall 
enter into the Kingdom of Heaven ; but he that doeth the 
will of my Father who is in heaven.^^ — Christ. 

"Behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to 
give to every man as his work shall be. I am Alpha and 
Omega, the beginning and the end. Blessed are they that 
do his commandments, that they may have right to the 
tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the 
city:'— Christ. 

"Add to your faith virtue; and to virtue, knowl- 
edge; and to knowledge, temperance; and to temperance, 
patience; and to patience, godliness; and to godliness, 
brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, charity. 
For if these things be iu you, and abound, they make you 



196 REmmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

that you shall be neither barren nor unfruitful in the 
knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.^^ — Peter. 

"The rather brethren, give diligence to make your call- 
ing and election sure : for if ye do these things, ye shall 
never ftill : for so an entrance shall be ministered unto 
you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord 
and Saviour Jesus Christ/' — Pete7\ 

"Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by 
the things which he suffered; and, being made perfect, he 
became the author of eternal salvation to all them that 
obey him/' — Paul. 

Not one word said about a mere matter of opinion — not 
a word; faith and obedience are all that are spoken of and, 
of course, all that can be required. 

Who would not, then, for the sake of union, harmony 
and good will keep his opinions as private property, and 
contend, not for them, but earnestly contend for the faith 
once delivered to the saints ? Opiiiionism among Protest- 
ants is the leaf which poisons the fountain, and causes 
many to avoid the stream who are persons of fine minds 
and benevolent impulses, and who stand aloof from all 
religious sects and denominations, taking no part in the 
w^ar of words and strife about what the contending parties 
have taught them to regard as mere non-essentials. But, 
unfortunately, they have also been taught to look upon 
some of Christ's positive commands as among the non- 
essentials. Let us make no man's opinions a test of 
Christian fellowship, and a rule whereby to measure the 
religious stature of any one. Let faith in, and obedience 
to, the great Head of the Church be the only criterion of 
our neighbors' standing as either a saint or a sinner, lost 
or saved. 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES, 197 



THE NEW BIRTH. 

" Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and 
of the Spirit, he can not enter into the kingdom of God." — John iii. 5. 

If it were not a fact that man}^ sermons have been 
preached, and many are being preached, perhaps daily, on 
the theme of being ^^born again,^^ by men who shed no 
light on the question, and leave it just where they found 
it — that is, dark and mysterious to both themselves and 
their hearers — I know not that there would be any neces- 
sity for a discourse on the subject. 

In preaching the gospel of Christ from Jerusalem to all 
Judea, thence in Samaria and to the ends of the earth, 
there is not an intimation that the apostles ever preached 
a discourse on the question of being born again ; nor is 
there a single allusion to the ^^new birth '^ in Luke^s Acts 
of Apostles. But, inasmuch as it is made a popular theme 
by Protestant preachers; and whereas, it is recorded in the 
third chapter of Jolm's memoir of Christ and in the first 
chapter of Peter's first letter to the churches throughout 
JPontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, it is im- 
portant to understand just what the Scriptures teach on 
this subject — nothing more, and nothing less. 

There are some things important to note very carefully 
in our judgment, in order to a proper understanding of 
the subject. 

1. The conversation of Christ with Nicodemus was not 
published earlier than the sixty-eighth year of the Chris- 
tian era. 



198 BEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

2. Before the sixtieth year of the Christian era, the gos- 
pel was preached and churches organized in almost every 
province of the great Roman Empire. 

3. There is no record given us by Luke, in the Acts, of 
any allusion by the apostles to being born again. 

4. Inasmuch as the Saviour said: ^^ Except a man be 
born of water and of the Spirit, he can not enter into 
the kingdom of God,^^ it is clear that all who did enter 
into the kingdom, under the personal teaching of the apos- 
tles, were born again* 

5. It follows from the foregoing truths that a theory of 
the new birth was not necessary to those who became the 
subjects of it; but wdiatever was necessary then, is neces- 
sary now to be known by the subject of the new birth, and 
whatever is necessary now to be known was necessary 
then — nothing more, nothing less. 

6. We have the whole amount now of what the Scrip- 
tures say on the subject. It is our privilege to examine 
all that they do say, and to examine, too, with whatever 
aids we have at hand, in order to a proper understanding 
and comprehension of the subject. 

The language of Jesus in John iii. 5, must be taken in 
one of two senses. It is either literal or figurative. We 
must understand the language to be literal, or else Ave must 
understand it to be figurative. We dare not understand 
any language to be figurative when there is no proper bar 
to its being construed literally; but when there is an in- 
separable bar to literal construction, we are forced to the 
alternative of construing it figuratively. We trust- the 
time has forever passed where men talked and wrote of 
the spiritual meaning of language. Language is made the 
medium of conveying ideas concerning spiritual things as 
well as of natural things, and it is always to be taken lit- 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 199 

erally if possible, and figuratively only when it can not be 
otherwise understood. 

When Jesus said, " Except a man be born of water and 
of the Spirit, he can not enter into the kingdom of God,^^ 
what does the language convey ? " Language is a thought- 
throwing machine,'^ what are the ideas or thoughts which 
are meant to be conveyed ? All persons think the same 
thing as to what is meant by the Spirit. We presume 
that it is the universal understanding of those w^ho read 
the Scriptures that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit meant. 
In regard to this there is no possible chance for an issue. 
But, what is meant by water ? All will, no doubt, agree 
that water means water. In this passage, are we to under- 
stand it literally or figuratively ? There being no bar to 
our understanding it literally, the laws of language forbid 
that we should understand it in any other sense, and 
therefore we do so understand it. But, some one may ob- 
j-ect ; the term water is sometimes used in the Scriptures in 
a figurative sense, and why not so used in this passage ? 
In answer to this objection, we say firstj that the word 
water is never used in a figurative sense in the Bible, except 
where it would be impossible to understand it in any other 
sense. Secondly, when used in a metaphorical sense, there 
is always some qualifying word and adjunct indicating 
that it is not used literally. For example Christ, in 
speaking to the woman of Samaria, said: " If thou knew- 
est the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, give 
me to drink, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he 
would have given thee living water" (John iv. 10). Ob- 
serve the word living here used to qualify water. The 
entire context shows that water can not here be under- 
stood literally, and, therefore, it is used in a metaphorical 
sense. Again, " The Spirit and the bride say, Come. 
And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that. 



200 EEMINISCESCES AND INCIDENTS. 

is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the 
water of life freely "(Rev. xxii. 17). Here it is plain 
that the words " of life " qualify the word water, and fix 
its meaning as a figurative one. These passages are suffi- 
cient to illustrate our proposition, or we might cite others 
of the same kind. 

But when it is said " Moses took water, with scarlet 
wool and hyssop," water means literally water. We must , 
therefore understand water, in John iii. 5, as well as < 
Spirit, in a literal sense ; but the birth itself must, of ne- 
cessity, be understood in a metaphorical sense. * 

Water and Spirit are used in their obvious, primary, I 
literal sense. Their agency is necessary — absolutely nee- | 
essary — in producing the ^' new birth J^ The effect can not 
be produced without the causes ; neither can one be taken 
as the sole cause of the eifect, and the other excluded. To 
be born of water alone is impossible. To be born of the 
Spirit alone is equally impossible. Impossible, because 
Jesus said, ^^ Except a man be born of water and the 
Spirit." They are conjoined by him, and they can not be 
separated. The question of separating them can not even 
be raised without corrupting the word of God by setting 
up human reason against the sayings of Him who '^ spake 
as never man spake." Then it is clear as demonstration 
that no man ever was born again, no man can now be 
born again, no man ever shall be born again, in the 
sense, whatever it may be, that was intended by Christ, 
without being born of water and the Spirit. He said 
what he meant, and meant what he said. 

But if we had no further information on the question 
of being born again, should we be able, by what is said in 
John iii. 5, to determine the nature of the new birth, and 
decide how one is to enter into the kingdom of God? 
We may construe, analyze, and criticise the passage as 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 201 

much as we please, but will that enable us to understand 
the nature of the "new birth/' which is unquestionably a 
metaphorical use of language? The change indicated by 
the Saviour is real, radical, complete. He speaks of the 
change by comparing it to a birth, not literally; for 
" that which is born of the flesh is flesh,'' and this would 
be no real change. Were such a second birth possible, 
nothing new would be effected in the subject of it. -It 
was to relieve the question from this view, which the 
ruler of the' Jews seemed to entertain, that Jesus informed 
him that the birth of which he spoke was not literally for 
one to enter again into his mother's womb and be re- 
born, but to be born again of water and the Spirit. 

About at this point we are usually invited to a consid- 
eration of the eighth verse of the third of John: "The 
wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound 
thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither 
it goeth : so is every one that is born of the Spirit." 
Every one that is born of the Spirit is so, compared to 
something. To what is he compared? To the wind? 
To the Spirit? There is not a comparison of the wind 
with the Spirit in the passage. IN'o proper grammatical 
analysis can arrive at such a comparison. The compari- 
son is between the person born of the Spirit, and some- 
thing else. I ask the Biblical scholar to say what the 
subject of this birth is compared to, and he is mute. If 
not, he had better be if he has no other Scripture on the 
same point I have read the learned criticisms of many 
learned men and Biblical scholars on this portion of the 
word of God, and they all fail to produce any thing satis- 
factory so long as they try to give an exposition of the 
passage by the use of grammar and logic confined to this 
isolated passage. 

One learned reviewer, in a grave and logical argument, 



202 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

says Fnc.uma means Spirit and not wind. Another 
learned translator of the New Testament so translates it : 
^^ The Spirit breathes where he pleases/^ The same trans- 
lator gives us wind from the same Greek word in Heb. i. 
7 — '^ Who makes his angels winds.^^ The Bible Union 
men give us wind in both passages, and the one under con- 
sideration reads : ^^ The Vvind blows where it will." This 
is good English, and I have no reason to doubt that it is 
a correct rendering of the Greek. From the foregoing 
considerations, among others that might be ' named, we 
have long ago concluded that the learned gentlemen who 
have taken, so much pains, and expended so much mental 
labor to understand the passage in its isolated state, and 
give a clear exegesis, had as well acknowledge their ina- 
bility to master it in this way, and look elsewhere for fur- 
ther developments on the same subject. 

To be born again is to be born once more. There is 
only one new birth meant in the. passage. It will be con- 
ceded that the Apostle Peter referred to precisely the same 
thing that the Saviour did. He, in addressing ^^the 
strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappa- 
docia, Asia, and Bythinia," represents them as "chosen 
according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, 
through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and 
sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.'^ To these per- 
sons he says: "Seeing ye have purified your souls in 
obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love 
of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure 
heart fervently : being born again, not of corruptible 
seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which 
liveth and abideth forever'^ (1 Peter i. 22, 23). In view 
of this passage we remark: 

1. These persons were born again. They were born 
of water and of the Spirit; because they could not be 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 203 

born again, in the sense of the Saviour, without being born 
of water and of the Spirit. This is the explanation of 
Christ. Nicodemus marveled when Christ said, "Ex- 
cept a man be born again, he can not see the kingdom. ^^ 
The explanation is, he did not mean a natural birth 
again, but this: A man must be born of water and of the 
Spirit in order to enter into the kingdom of God. 

2. The persons addressed by Peter were in the king- 
dom; because it is clearly implied that if those Vvho 
have not been born again have not entered into the king- 
dom of God, those who have been born again have entered 
into the kingdom of God. This being established, it fol- 
lows, beyond doubt, that they had been born of water and 
of the Spirit, or else they could not be in the kingdom. 

Now, let us look a little more at this Scripture. Peter 
says they were born again, not of perishable seed, and 
this imperishable seed he says is the word of God, and 
this word he says (1 Peter i. 25) is by the gospel 
preached. 

Let us now turn to another passage : " Of his own will 
begat he us with the word of truth ^' (James i. 18). On 
this we remark, that a part of the new birth is to be be- 
gotten. The instrumentality which the will of God has 
chosen for the purpose of begetting is, according to 
Jam.es, the word of truth. This is the incorruptible, or 
imperishable, seed. This enters into the mind by the 
agency of the Holy Spirit. How by the agency of the 
Holy Spirit? Is it direct, or indirect? The word of 
God is not the Holy Spirit. The gospel is the word of 
God; it is the word of truth; therefore, as the beget- 
ting is through the word of truth, beyond all peradvcn- 
ture or doubt the agency of the Holy Spirit is indirect. 
It is mediate, and the medium is the word of truth. The 
Holy Spirit begets. The seed is the word of God. When 



204 EE3IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS, 

one is begotten by the word, it is the same as to say be- 
gotten by the Holy Spirit through the word of truth. 
This is the fact, although the sacred writers have not 
made use of such phraseology. Neither would it be 
necessary now, if the mystic doctors had not brought 
forth the idea of the nondescript, direct, immediate oper- 
ation of the Spirit on the naked spirit of man by impact, 
than which no idea has more bewildered and led astray 
the millions who are famishing for want of the word of 
life. Paul to the Thessalonians said : " When ye received 
the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not 
as the word of men, but, as it is in truth, the word of 
God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe'^ 
(1 Thess. ii. 13). 

We now propose to consider some things in regard to 
what the Saviour said in conversation with the senator of 
Israel. 

1. The kingdom of God is that which is objectively 
made prominent: "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except 
a man be born again, he can not see the kingdom of God.^' 
The new birth contemplates a transition from one state 
into another. The change is from that state in which 
the natural birth places a man, to that state which is 
called the kingdom of God. 'No one, whatever may be 
his rank or position by natural birth, can, by virtue 
thereof, enter into and enjoy the blessings and immunities 
of the kingdom of God. The natural descendants of the 
friend of God, even the children of Abraham according 
to the flesh, though they are priests or members of the 
great council, could not claim to have a right to the 
blessings of this kingdom without being born again. 
That which is born of the Spirit is spirit; not that which 
is born of the flesh, for that is flesh. The new birth is 
a birth of Avater and the Spirit. We have already seen 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES, 205 

that there is a begetting by the Spirit through the in- 
strumentality of the word, the gospel of our salvation. 
We have also seen that Peter, when writing to those wHo 
were born again, speaks of the word of God, and that 
aloJie as that of which they were born again. He does 
not mention the Spirit, nor does he mention water. Never- 
theless, they were born again of water and of the Spirit, 
because they could not otherwise be born again. So said 
Christ. 

We are now ready to understand this subject, and show 
why the apostles did not preach any on the subject; and 
also why no theor^y of being born again was elaborated by 
them. 

It is not any theory of the ^^new birth" that avails any 
thing, but that which avails is the thing itself. The only 
theory which the Saviour sets forth, is the simple state- 
ment that a man must be born of water and of the Spirit; 
but this does not contain any intimation as to how a man 
is to be born of these things, and this we shall find some- 
where else, if we find it at all. 

In order to a proper elucidation of this subject, we 
state, in the first place, the fact that just preceding the 
crucifixion of the Son of God, the kingdom of God — or, the 
same thing, the kingdom of heaven — was at hand, not yet 
set up. All the preliminaries for setting up the kingdom 
were arranged during the personal ministry of the Saviour. 
A kingdom can not exist without, first, a king; second, 
subjects ; and third, laws. The kingdom of God, or of 
heaven, that w^as announced as at hand was a kingdom 
not like those earthly kingdoms over which man exer- 
cised sovereignty. " My kingdom is not of this world, 
else would my servants fight.'^ It was not to be estab- 
lished by the power of the carnal weapons used in the 
slaughter of poor humanity, but by the power of the 



206 BE^IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS, 

"sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." The 
King himself was alone to be the mighty Sufferer. His 
blood was to be shed, his soid to be made an offering for 
sin before he could be crowned Lord of all. He suffered 
on the cross after he had suffered untold agony in Geth- 
semane. He hung between the trembling heavens and 
the astonished earth. Yea, "who for the joy that w^as 
set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame; 
and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God." 
He passed through the dark and gloomy region of death 
to reach the crown, which was not given by mortal hands, 
but by the sinless, spotless intelligences of the upper world. 
From Mount Olivet, and in view of a band of his hum- 
ble followers, he ascended from the scene of his conflict 
with the powers of darkness. While yet in view of the 
scenes of his cruel mockings, scourgings and buffetings, 
his disciples continue to gaze upon his ascending form, as 
it rises high above all care and gloom and sorrow — above 
all earth-taint, and without spot or blemish from the 
close contact with the powers of evil — until a bright cloud 
received him from their sight, and he is taken up "into 
glory." 

"Crown the Saviour! angels crown Him; 

Rich the trophies Jesus brings ; 
In the seat of power enthrone him ; 

While the heavenly concert rings, 
Crown him! crown him! 

Crown the Saviour King of kings. 

"Hark! those bursts of acclamation! 
Hark! those loud triumphant cords! 
Jesus takes the highest station; 
Oh, what joy the sight affords ! 

Crown him! crown him! 
King of kings, and Lord of lords ! " 

Just before his ascension, he gave a last commission to. 



CHARA CTEEISTIC DISCO UESES. 207 

those -whom lie had chosen to attend to the affairs of the 
kino-dom on this earth after he should be crowned Lord 
of all. As rendered bv the Bible Union, the commission 
reads thus: ^^And Jesus came and spake to them, saying, 
All power is given to me in heaven and on earth. Go 
therefore, and disciple all the nations, immersing them in 
the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy 
Spirit. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever 
I command you ; and behold, I am with you unto the 
end of the workV' (Matt, xxviii. 19, 20). 

Somewhere and at sometime between the giving of this 
commission and the time of the date of PauPs letters to 
the Ephesians and the Colossians the kingdom v:as set up. 
This proposition is clear from the following Scripture : 
"Giving thanks unto the Father, who hath made us meet 
to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light : 
who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and 
hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son'' 
(Col: i. 12, 13). These brethren are said by the apostle 
to be in the kingdom of God's dear Son. They had been 
delivered and translated. The tense of the verbs is the 
same. If they were delivered from the power of dark- 
ness before Paul w^rote to them, so were they translated 
into the kingdom. The transition was from one state to 
another — " from darkness to light, from the power of 
Satan unto God." They had received the remission of 
sins, and an inheritance among the sanctified, through 
faith in Christ Jesus. Being in the kingdom, they were, 
of necessity, born again ; because they could not enter 
into it without being born again. But they could not be 
born again without being born of water and the Spirit. 
Now, how Avas water brought into requisition in the case 
of the brethren at Colosse ? Let us see : " And ye are 
complete in him, which is the head of all principality and 



208 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS, 

power : in whom also ve are circumcised with the circum- 
cision made without hands, in putting off the body of the 
sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ: buried 
with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him 
through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised 
him from the dead^^ (Col. ii. 10-12). 

Faith and immersion are here shown to have preceded 
the remission of sins. They were buried in baptism ; 
they were raised again. They were in the kingdom. 
They must have been born again. When they were 
raised from their burial in baptism, they were born of 
water, and thus was water brought into requisition. 
This is in accordance with the commission quoted from 
Matthew; the apostles were commanded to make disci- 
ples, baptizing them, etc. '^Husbands, love your wives, 
even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself 
for it ; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the 
washing of water by the word, that he might present it 
to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle, 
or any such thing; but that it should be holy and with- 
out blemish ^^ (Eph. v. 25-27). In this Scripture, the 
apostle speaks of the discipled as a glorious church 
cleansed by the washing of ivater by the u'ord. Water 
is here used as an essential in order to the cleansing of 
the church. In Colossians, the church is spoken of 
under the phrase ^^ kingdom of God's dear Son." At 
Colosse, they are said to be "buried with Christ in bap- 
tism," and to have been "translated into the kingdom." 
It is plain from these premises that Paul uses the terms 
kingdom and church interchangeably. The church is 
Christ's, the kingdom is his also. He is head over all 
things to the church, and he is the head of the body, 
the church. "Let us draw near with a true heart, in 
full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 209 

an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure 
water^' (Heb. x. 22). Here the body is said to be 
washed — not the soul nor spirit^ but the body. Again, 
'^Tlie like figure whereunto baptism doth also now save 
us, (not the putting away the filth of the flesh, but the 
answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resur- 
rection of Jesus Christ '^ (1 Peter iii. 21). Observe, he 
speaks of the salvation of Noah and his family by 
icater, and immediately uses the words above quoted. 

We have before shown that the Apostle Peter speaks 
of these persons as having been born a^ain of the incor- 
ruptible seed — the word of God. In the passage last 
cited, he says they were saved by baptism. But before 
they were born again, they were not saved. When they 
were born again, they were saved. Before they were 
baptized, they were not saved; w^hen they were baptized, 
they were saved. This shows the new birth and baptism 
to be so connected that it is impossible to separate them ; 
the one includes the other. Baptism is part of the new 
birth, and therefore without it the new birth can not 
occur. This also explains what is meant when Paul 
says. The Church is saved, sanctified, and cleansed by 
the washing of water by the word. They were born 
again by the word. In the word or gospel baptism is 
essential to the new birth ; it is therefore part and 
parcel of the word or gospel which is preached. 

Again it is said, "And Crispus, the chief ruler of the 
synagogue, believed on the Lord with all his house ; and 
many of the Corinthians hearing, believed and were bap- 
tized" (Acts xviii. 8). To these same persons Paul wrote 
as follows : " Unto the Church of God which is at Cor- 
inth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called 
to b3 saints, with all that in every place call upon the 
name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours'' 
18 



210 REmmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

(1 Cor. i. 2). Before these persons were sanctified in 
Christ Jesus, they were not born again. Before they 
heard, believed and were baptized, they were not sancti- 
fied in Christ Jesus our Lord. But when they believed 
and were baptized, they were sanctified, and were, of 
course, born again. They were born of water and of 
the Spirit, because there is no other way of being born 
again. 

Again : ^^ Not by works of righteousness which we 
have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by 
the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy 
Spirit" (Titus iii. 5). Here, something is alluded to 
called the ^^ washing of regeneration." In Ephesians, we 
have "washing of icater by the word." In Hebrews, 
" Our bodies washed with pure water. ^^ In Peter's first 
letter we have "eight souls were saved by loater, the 
like figure whereunto baptism now saves us," etc. 
From the premises, it is plain that the washing of 
regeneration and baptism in water are identical. Bap- 
tism is not, therefore, regeneration, but only the wash- 
ing thereof. It is such washing of regeneration to be- 
lievers only: "Go preach the gospel to every creature. 
He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved ; but he 
that believes not shall be damned " (Mark xvi. 15, 16). 
And for answer as to what it is to believe in the sense 
of the passage last cited, we refer to Gal. iii. 26, 27 : 
"For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ 
Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into 
Christ have put on Christ." 

We are now prepared to affirm and prove that, to believe 
and to be baptized, is to be born again in the sense 
meant by the Saviour in his conversation with Kico- 
demus. 

On the occasion of the first discourse delivered by the 



CHAR A CTERISTIC DISCO VRSES. 211 

apostles, there were three thousand persons added. These 
three thousand are said to have continued in the apostles' 
teaching; and, it is said, "And the Lord added to the 
church daily the saved" (Acts ii. 47). Were, or were not, 
the three thousand saved? Certainly they were saved; 
because the Lord added the saved. Hoic, then, were they 
saved? By an examination of the second chapter of 
Acts we shall see how the Holy Spirit and water consti- 
tute essential elements in that real change of heart and 
state and life which the blessed Redeemer saw fit to 
speak of under the metaphor of being born again. 

On the first Pentecost after the ascension of our Lord, 
he sent the Holy Spirit to the apostles, and endued them 
with power from on high: "And they (the apostles) 
were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak 
with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance " 
(Acts ii. 4). Now the apostles are prepared to preach 
the gospel with the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven : 
"Unto whom (the prophets) it was revealed, that not 
unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the 
things, which are now reported unto you by them that 
have preached the gospel unto you by the Holy Spirit 
sent down from heaven'^ (1 Peter i. 12). 

" For though ye have ten thousand instructors in 
Christ, yet have ye not many fathers : for in Christ 
Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel " (1 Cor. 
iv. 15). 

"I beseech you for my son Onesimus, whom I have 
begotten in my bonds " (Phil. 10). 

The gospel is the instrument, the apostles medium of 
speech, and the Holy Spirit the agent — the primary agent, 
in begetting. The begetting is, of course, the work of the 
Holy Spirit, through the apostles, by the word of God or 
the gospel. 



212 BEMimSCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

Peter stood up with the eleven and spoke as the Spirit 
gave him utterance. Many were convinced of sin, and 
cried out to Peter and the rest of the apostles, '^ Men and 
brethren, what must we do ? ^^ " Repent, and be baptized 
every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the re- 
mission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy 
Spirit,^^ was the answer. We are informed that as many 
as received Plis word gladly were baptized, and there 
were added that day about three thousand souls. In this 
same way all w^ere added to the church. In this way all 
entered who became citizens of the kingdom of our Lord 
and Saviour Jesus Christ. 

We have learned by the foregoing examination and in- 
vestigation of this subject several things, which may be 
set out in a much condensed form, as follows, viz : 

1. Except a man be born again of water and of the 
Spirit, he can not enter into the kingdom of God. 

2. The phrase, ^^born again," is a figure taken from a 
natural birth. 

3. The terms water and Spirit are used in their literal 
sense. 

4. No theory of tbe new birth is stated by the Saviour. 
6. Not the theory, but the thing itself, avails any thing. 

6. The new birth is into a kingdom out of darkness. 

7. The Holy Spirit begets through the word of truth. 

8. The first converts to Christ, in pursuance of the 
great commission, were begotten by the Spirit, and were 
baptized. 

9. That these were born again of water and of the Holy 
Spirit. 

10. That all who were begotten by the Spirit and 
brought forth of w^ater, were born again in the sense in- 
tended by the Saviour. 

11. That if the primitive converts to Christianity had 



CHAR A CTEBISTIC DISCO URSES. 213 

never heard any thing in regard to being born again, still 
they left a state of sin and entered into the kingdom, and 
were sanctified and saved, and stood in the relation to 
God contemplated by Christ when he conversed with 
Nicodemus. 

12. That to believe and to be baptized is to be born 
again. 

13. And finally, the apostles in the preaching of the 
gospel, preached water, literal water, for no other purpose 
than for that of baptizing believers. And, therefore, the 
baptized believer is born of water and of the Spirit, and 
there is no other way, and never was, of being born again. 



214 BEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 



THE GRACE OF GOD. 

" For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, 
teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live 
soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present Avorld ; looking for that 
blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Sav- 
iour Jesus Christ : who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from 
all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good 
works."— Titus ii. 11-14. 

We call attention to this Scripture that we may con- 
sider the points submitted by the apostle in the order in 
which he has arranged them. 

First — What is meant by the grace of God ? What 
idea is presented to our minds by these words? for words 
are only significant when they carry the idea of him who 
uses them to the ears of those who hear them, so that the 
idea, and not merely the word, may be understood by 
hearer and speaker alike. A word may convey no idea at 
all, or it may convey an idea diiferent from that for the 
conveyance of which it is used. If none is conveyed, all 
the words used are fruitless, but if an idea different from 
that in the mind of the speaker is received by the hearer, 
misunderstanding and confusion are sure to ensue. 

Unfortunately the word grace has become a technical 
one, and is almost entirely confined in its use to theology, 
not being employed much, if any, in a common way. On 
this account, it is thought by many to be a word which 
conveys the idea that there is some mysterious, nonde- 
sciipt, secret moving of the Holy Spirit's influence on the 
human soul whereby some spiritual benefit is conferred 
on those who are so fortunate as to have received it. For 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 215 

this sort of work, neither eyes nor ears are interposed be- 
tween this mysterious working and the inner man. We 
read of the '^ grace of faith," " the grace of repentance," 
" once in grace, always in grace," and to the world in 
general this word is surrounded by mystery. We prefer, 
therefore, to use a term about which there hangs no mys- 
tery, and which we all use in the same sense, so that we 
all get the same idea. Suppose we substitute the word 
favor for the word grace, and then we shall understand 
each other, and also the passage under consideration. We 
are aware that the original word {charts) from which we 
have the word grace in the passage, is variously used in 
the New Testament Scriptures ; but no word known to us 
better conveys the idea of the original than the word 
favor, so far as this text is concerned. The translators of 
the common English version of the New Testament some- 
times use the word favor as a translation of the same 
Greek word as in Acts xxv. 3 — '^ And desired favor 
(cliarin) against him, that he would send for him to Jeru- 
salem." And in the third verse of 1 Cor. xvi, they trans- 
late it liberality, when the liberality spoken of is the gift 
or favor which Paul, with so much earnestness, had urged 
them to send to the poor saints at Jerusalem. But, as we 
proceed, the context will bring out more fully the mean- 
ing of the word in this connection. 

We define a favor, or a grace, to be something needed, 
which we receive and enjoy without giving an equivalent. 
If one thing is given in exchange for another, there is no 
grace or favor about the transaction. The gift must be 
without merit on the part of the recipient, and then it is a 
favor or grace. Here the apostle speaks of the favor of 
God — not the favor of men, but of God — which brings sal- 
vation. The world was lost, ruined by reason of sin. 
Traveling through darkness to the blackness of darkness 



216 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

forever, man was not in a condition to furnish himself any 
remedy, or to extricate himself from sin and the power of 
the wicked one. Lost in the dark wilderness of a wicked 
world, he could only wander round and round, in giddy 
circles, without the possibility of finding his way out. 
Helpless, hopeless, without merit, he could make no offer 
nor offering whereby he could lay hold on the divine 
clemency. In this miserable, forlorn and inexpressibly 
horrible situation, the Father of mercies laid help on one 
who was mighty to save and strong to deliver. Through 
riches of mercy, moved by matchless love, God sent his 
Son to be the Saviour of the world. This we must regard 
as favor without a parallel. 

But the specific thing of which the apostle speaks in the 
passage, which he says brings salvation to all men, is the 
gospel. It is called elsewhere '^ the gospel of the grace 
of God.^' This proposition we proceed to prove. What- 
ever it is which is here called the grace of God, is some- 
thing which has appeared and brings salvation. In Rom. 
i. 14-16, Paul says: "I am debtor both to the Greeks, 
and to the barbarians; both to the wise, and to the un- 
wise. So, as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the 
gospel to you that are at Rome also. For I am not 
ashamed of the gospel of Christ : for it is the power of 
God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the 
Jew first, and also to the Greek," Here we see that the 
gospel is adapted to all classes, nations, ranks and condi- 
tions, and that throughout all humanity it is the power of 
God unto salvation to all that believe. 

We observe that to bring the gospel of the grace of 
God within reach is one thing, and this God does. To 
accept and be saved by it is man's business. He must 
attend to this part, otherwise he can not be saved, notwith- 
standing the means of salvation is within his reach. Some 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 217 

argue that if we do any thing ourselves in order to be 
saved, then salvation is thought to be of works and not of 
grace, which is contrary to the teaching of Paul when he 
says: '' Kot of works, lest any man should boast.^^ But what 
is not of works ? Do not the facts concerning the church at 
Ephesus plainly show this? The popular mistake which 
is made in this matter, arises from viewing the whole sub- 
ject sometimes from one side, and sometimes from the 
other, when it always ought to be viewed from a stand- 
point which will present both sides at once — man on one 
side and God on the other. So far as the whole means of 
salvation are concerned, they were conceived in the eternal 
mind before the ages; remained for ages on ages as an 
unrevealed mystery, and were finally fully developed and 
revealed at an immense and incalculable cost to our mer- 
ciful heavenly Father. He spared not his only-begotten 
Son, but gave him to die, the just for the unjust, that he 
might bring the people to God. All on this side of the 
question was " not of works." No effort on the part of 
man had given him any meritorious claim to demand of 
God the priceless gift which he freely bestowed. Man 
had not merited salvation ; but while the world w^as wholly 
lost in sin and rebellion against God, he determined to 
oifer salvation, because of his great love. On this side 
all is matchless, boundless grace. 

Let us look carefully at the language in Ephesians, in 
its proper connection, that we may ascertain clearly what 
is said and meant by the apostle. In the first chapter of 
this letter, it is said : '^ In whom ye also trusted, after that 
ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; 
in whom also, after that ye believed, ye were sealed with 
that Holy Spirit of promise" (Eph. i. 13.) Here we ob- 
serve they heard the gospel of their salvation,, and having 
heard, they believed, for faith comes by hearing the gos- 
19 



218 RE3IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

pel. "Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word 
of God/^ says Paul. "And this/' says Peter, " is the word 
which by the gospel is preached unto- you." After the 
Ephesians heard and believed, they were sealed with that 
Holy Spirit of promise, which is the order of God in the 
salvation of men. Then, in the eighth verse of chapter 
ii. the apostle says to these same brethren : " For by grace 
are ye saved through faith ; and that not of yourselves : it 
is the gift of God.'' Grace is on God's part, but faith is on 
man's part. God furnishes all necessary means of believ- 
ing, but he does not believe for any one. But the Avriter 
continues: "Not of works, lest any man should boast ;'^ 
which clearly shows that not faith and not grace are said 
here to be the gift of God, but salvation, which, as a 
grace or favor, is freely offered to all through faith. 

The grace of God which bringeth salvation has ap- 
peared ; but the fact that it has appeared does not save 
any one, for it must be accepted in order that it may 
bring to each individual the salvation which is offered. 
Some are afraid to do any thing for fear they will be pre- 
sumptuous, in that it would seem as though they were try- 
ing to merit salvation by their own acts of obedience. 
We may better appreciate the fallacy of this idea by an 
illustration: Suppose there comes to your door a famished 
and weary stranger, who informs you of his condition, and 
asks you for assistance, and at the same time tells you he 
has nothing of the least value with which to reward you 
for the boon he asks. You pity his condition, and are 
moved to supply him abundantly Avitb the necessary things 
he asks of you. Would he refuse to eat on the ground that 
by the act of eating he w^uld merit your favor, and that 
he desired what you did for him to come as pure favor? 
Does not he know, as you do, that on your part all you 
give is grace, and that his accepting and eating has no 



CEABACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 219 

semblance of merit about it? The whole benefit accrues 
to him. He renders you no equivalent, but joyfully and 
thankfully receives and appropriates your favor, with 
heart-felt blessings upon the head of his kind benefactor. 

Again, some argue that because the favor of God that 
brings salvation has appeared to all men, that therefore 
all will be saved. This conclusion is just as illogical a? 
would be the reasoning of the mendicant who would 
reason that because a repast had been furnished for a 
number of persons, therefore they will be refreshed not- 
withstanding •they refuse to eat. Just so it is with the 
gospel of God. It brings salvation, but none are saved 
except those who receive and obey it. 

Shall we look at this grace in another aspect? Some 
suppose that the grace spoken of is not that which comes 
in the words of the gospel, but by a " still, small voice,^' 
so still, indeed, that it does not say any thing at all. 
This can not be that of which the apostle is writing, 
because he says it teaches : " Teaching us that denying 
ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, 
righteously and godly in this present world." This it 
teaches, and by a careful observance of this teaching, we 
will receive to ourselves great benefit in this world and 
indescribable blessing in the world to come. 

Negatively, then, it teaches us not to conform to ungod- 
liness and worldly lusts, but to deny ourselves all such 
gratifications as belong only to the flesh, and which lead 
the soul from God, and drown men in sorrow and perdi- 
tion. Xo Christian dare allow these things to have do- 
minion over him. They are not of the Father, but of the 
world. The world passes away, and the lusts thereof, and 
the interests of that spirit which shall exist through 
countless ages demand that something shall be lain hold 
of by men, which may be clung to when the flesh is in the 



220 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

grave, and when the world itself has perished. How this 
something else may be secured, this grace of God also 
teaches affirmatively, by shoAving how we should live in 
this present world. Unlike some teachers of the present 
day, it raises no speculation, and formulates no theor^^ of 
how men Avill, or ouglit to live, far over in eternity; but 
confining itself to the present wants of humanity, it 
points out to us how we should live here and now, that 
we may be fitted for the joys unspeakable which God 
has in store for his obedient children. For the benefit of 
those wdio never fail, when the word grace af)pears in any 
passage of Scripture, to see something mysterious and pe- 
culiar in it, we suggest the thought, that Paul says this 
grace teaches, and the things he enumerates as taught by 
it are precisely those taught in the gospel. Now, as we 
know of nothing but the gospel which has appeared and 
is teaching these things, the conclusion must be that the 
particular grace or favor of God here mentioned, is not 
every one, or all of the countless, unmerited benefits 
which God has conferred and is conferring upon men, but 
is that distinct and incomparable favor which teaches us 
how to get away from sin and death, and secure undying 
life through Jesus Christ. 

The gospel is a grace of God, and to those who rightly 
apprehend it, may well, by way of preeminence, be called 
the grace of God. Having pointed out to us what we are 
to deny ourselves, it next tells us what to do as the posi- 
tive part of our work in accepting and appropriating what 
God^s great love has put within our grasp. We must live 
soberly. This is a personal affair, and consists in such a 
curbing of our passions, and such a use of our individual 
powers, as will conduce to our present individual well- 
being. But we must live, not only soberly, but right- 
eously, which respects our dealings with our fellow- men. 



CHARACTEFJSTIC DISCO URSES, 221 

If a man were living where lie could have no sort of 
association with his fellow-men, all the requirements of 
the most correct code of morals would be met by him in 
living soberly. He would have no further duty in this 
respect than to treat himself well, to keep all his mental 
and physical powers in a state of perfect equipoise; but, 
being surrounded by other men, a line of duties arises out 
of his relation to them, and, to discharge these duties, is 
to live righteously. He must deal honestly in business, 
and fairly and carefully consider all the rights of others 
when in pursuit of his own individual interests. He 
must, in the words of that short and wonderful sentence 
uttered by the Saviour, '^ Do unto others as he would have 
them do unto him.^^ 

AVhen a man has strictly attended to these two things, 
he has fully carried out all that can be included in the 
most rigid code of morals. Mere morality can go no 
higher than to point out how one shall behave as an 
individual and as a member of society. There are many 
who have no other code, and who complacently flatter 
themselves that, being kind to themselves and their fellow- 
men, will secure to them the blessed boon of eternal life. 
But how little respect is paid to the great God who loved 
the world with so great a love, and who purchased eternal 
life at so great a price, by men who regulate their lives by 
so low a standard. They serve only their own genuine 
animal happiness by their lives of sobriety, and thus fol- 
low a law which pure selfishness might dictate. By living 
righteously they benefit society, are benefited in return, 
and are governed only by a slightly higher and wider law 
of selfishness. 

Godliness has reference to our relations to God; and to 
live godly is to be a Christian, a disciple of God's Son, to 
whom has been given all authority in heaven and on 



222 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

earth. The selfish man may be sober and righteous, but 
he can not be godly ; and only when one has humbled 
himself before God, confessing that the morality with 
which he can clothe himself is but filthy rags, and con- 
fidingly obeying Jesus Christ, that he may be clothed upon 
with divine righteousness, do sobriety and correct dealing 
with his fellow -creatures loom up out of the pit of human 
selfishness, shining with the divine glory which they reflect 
from godliness. Having put on Christ, a man no longer 
asks, " How shall I live so as to serve my individual, sel- 
fish interests?" but "How shall I live so as to be like 
Christ?'^ He no longer says, "How shall I treat my 
fellow-men so as to win their approbation and sym- 
pathy?" but, in ail his relations to them, Avhatever he 
does is done "as to the Lord, and not to men" (Eph. 
vi. 7). The highest, best and purest code of morals 
known to men is that contained in the gospel, but if the 
standard it sets up could be fully reached by men who 
refuse to obey Christ, they would still fall as far short of 
Christian perfection as humanity is below God. 

Godliness is required, and when it is reached man is 
brought not only into his true relation to God, but to a 
position where the divine nature may assist the human in 
all its relations to mankind and to the whole world. The 
prophet asks the question : " What is required of thee, 
oh man, but to love mercy and do justly" — as some read 
it, to suit their own notions of all that ought to be re- 
quired, stopping short of the point made, and forgetting 
that the inspired writer adds, *' and to walk humbly with 
thy God?" "I do no harm," says one; "I deal justly; 
I am merciful; I walk orderly before men; I go into no 
excesses; I am no slanderer, nor falsifier, nor extortioner; 
I am therefore as good, for any thing I can see, as the 
church members ; " forgetting that the great and good 



iCHARACTERJSTIC DISCOURSES, 223 

Father of all mercies is entitled to the supreme reverence 
and love of our most inmost soul, in view of all that he 
has done for us in respect to our temperal and eternal 
wants — in respect to soul and body. 

The text, again, makes another point — '^ Looking for 
that blessed hope," Yes, there is a blessed hope, which 
overtops all other hopes that ever entered the human soul. 
Hope is desire and expectation, and our heavenly Father 
has implanted this sentiment in our nature. How often, 
in the course of a life of ordinary length, are objects set up 
on which our desires and expectations fasten themselves, 
and how often are disappointments experienced ? How 
frequently, when reached, do the objects of our hopes fail 
to bring us the happiness we anticipate. Then new 
objects ai-e viewed rising far before us, and on and on we 
move in pursuit of that which always eludes us, yet al- 
ways seems about to be attained. Some achieve honor 
and fame; some heap up riches; some aspire to sway a 
scepter over their fellow-men ; some risk the dangers of 
the deep, and, leaving all behind, become wanderers and 
strangers that they may secure the things of this world. 
Some build palatial residences, and surround themselves 
with all that is luxurious and beautiful, expecting thus to 
secure happiness and ease. But with all earthly objects 
of hope secured, there is in the depths of man's nature 
an aching void the world can never fill. That longing, 
wishing, aspiring, thinking "I" — the true man within the 
house of clay — is not satisfied with all of wealth and 
power, because he can but be conscious that these things 
to him are but of short duration. He must look off to 
that not distant future, when he shall stand on the bor- 
ders of the eternal world, when the cold river of death 
will lave his feet and no possibility will exist of retracing 
his steps, or recalling the rapidly flown hours of his past 



224 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

life. He must move on, for the great throng of humanity 
flows ever onward. There is no halting place, and his next 
step must carry him into that boundless, fathomless ocean, 
called eternity. If, then, he is not in possession of that 
blessed hope, what shall console him ! So far as he is 
personally concerned, it matters not if all that is grand 
and gay and glorious on earth is swallowed up in confla- 
grations. What is it to him if empires and kingdoms fall 
into ruin; if all that human genius and human skill have 
erected on earth is blotted out, or if the great globe itself 
dissolves ? There can be no more of earth for him. His 
time is all in the past, and no object of earth or time can 
again be an object of hope to him. At this stage of his 
endless existence, nothing can afford him comfort and 
peace but the blessed hope referred to by the great apostle. 
The tears and lamentations of loved ones who stand 
around the bed of death, can bring no balm to the soul 
about to go forth from its tenement of clay. The soul 
without hope leaps, with a despairing shudder, into the 
boundless, unknown hereafter. But how different the last 
hours on earth of those who have that hope which is "an 
anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which 
entereth into that within the vail.'' Then, when the lamp 
of mortal life burns low, and the last adieu is taken of 
all the dear scenes and faces and objects of earth, the 
blessed hope becomes more precious than ever before, and 
lightens, with heavenly radiance, the darkest corners of 
the grave. With this hope the Christian may exclaim : 

" The world recedes ; it disappears! 
Heaven opens on my eyes ! my ears 

With sounds seraphic ring: 
Lend, lend your wings! I mount! I fly! 
Oh, Grave! where is thy victory? 

Oh, Death! where is thy sting?" 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 225 

This hope which reaches beyond the bounds of time and 
space, was a source of intense joy to the apostle, lifting 
him far above the toils, afflictions, and trials of this pres- 
ent life. " If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we 
are of all men most miserable.'' Having laid hold of 
this anchor of the soul, he endured hardships and perse- 
cutions without wavering, gloried in tribulations, and con- 
fidently looked forward to an eternal weight of glory. 
Poor in the things of earth, yet making many rich ; 
despised, yet not forsaken, he hopefully and joyfully 
struggled on ; and when at last his earthly career is all 
behind him, and the waves of death are about to roll over 
him, with the headsman's sword suspended above him, he 
sends down through the ages his shout of triumph in the 
midst of scenes to appall the stoutest soul ! ^' For I am 
now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is 
at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my 
course^ T have kept the faith : henceforth there is laid up 
for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the 
righteous Judge, shall give me at that day ; and not to me 
only, but unto all them also who love his appearing." 

" A hope so glorious, so divine 
May trials well endure, 
And purify our souls from sin, 
As Christ himself is pure." 

But one more point, and we are done : " The glorious 
appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." 
"We remark here that Dr Bloomfield has shoAvn clearly 
that by the sentence, " the glorious appearing of the great 
God/' Jesus the Christ is meant — looking for the glori- 
ous appearing of Jesus the Christ, w^hen he shall descend 
from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the arch- 
angel and with the trump of God. Yes, he is ordained to 
be the judge of the living and the dead. All judgment 



226 RE3nmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

is committed to the Son. He will reAvard every man ac- 
cording to his works. '' ^Ye must all appear before the 
judgment-seat of Christ; that every one may receive the 
things done in his body, according to that he hath done, 
whether it be good or bad '^ (2 Cor. v. 10). Again: 
^' Who will render to every man according to his deeds : 
to them who by patient continuance in well doing seek 
for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life" (Rom. 
ii. 6, 7). When that day shall be ushered in, we know 
not, but come when it may, it will bring with it the re- 
wards and penalties wdiich each individual of the human 
family shall merit. To those who have the hope spoken 
of. and who longingly look for the appearing of the glo- 
rious Jesus, and patiently wait and watch, foregoing the 
carnal, forbidden pleasures vrhich tempt from duty, it will 
be a glorious day and the beginning of a glorious eternity: 
*' This mortal shall put on immortality ; this corruptible 
shall put on incorruption ; and then shall be brought to 
pass the saying that is written. Death is swallowed up in 
victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where 
is thy victory ? Thanks be to God, who giveth us the 
victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!" Kings and 
queens of earth must lay aside their crowns, and all their 
earthly honors and luxuries only make colder the chill 
tide of death and more loathsome the hideousness of the 
grave. '^ Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return," 
being the sentence of God, must bring to the grave all the 
sons of men. But how grand and consoling, amidst these 
reflections, to look beyond the shadow of death, and be- 
yond the judgment, and with the eye of faith, see Jesus 
amid the glories of the eternal world, and know 
That unchangeable home is for you and for me, 

Where Jesus of Nazareth stands ; 
The King of all kingdoms forever is he, 

And he holdeth our crowns in his hands I 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 227 

We have learned that the grace of God that brings salva- 
tion to all men, is the apostolic gospel, "preached with the 
Holy Spirit sent down from heaven ;'^ that notwithstand- 
ing its having appeared, it will not save any except these 
who receive it. It must be obeyed. That it is not a non- 
descript influence on the human soul and affections, with- 
out the intervention of eyes or ears. That it was pro- 
claimed in the hearing of men and women, many of whom 
heard, believed, obeyed, and were saved; and that a \m\- 
tient contijuance in the teaching of this same gospel will 
secure a crown of fadeless and imperishable glory; that 
the grace of God talks to responsible, accountable beings, 
and so teaches them to deny ungodly things and practices, 
and to walk in a manner worthy of God. That is the ul- 
timatum of the most exalted and far-reaching aspirations 
and ambitions that are presented to the sentiment of hope, 
and points onward to the glorious appearing of the Lord 
Jesus, to receive his ransomed people, that they may ever 
live and associate with the resurrected, glorified, and be- 
atified spiritual throng in the restored paradise. There 
will be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying ; for the 
former things have passed away, and all things made new 
by the creative energy of the Lord God Almighty. 

Who that thinks, and longs, and washes, and hopes, and 
fears, amidst the perplexities and sorrows of this sin- 
cursed world, is unwilling to accept the favor of God that 
brings salvation from the guilt and shame of sin ? Who 
is unwilling to change the perishable hopes of earth for 
the stable and undying hope which the gospel of God^« 
fiivor brings? All earthly hope terminates with the dis- 
solution of the mortal body. The hope of the gospel pen- 
etrates into eternity, and leaves an un measurable distance 
behind the catastrophe of all mutable things. Why not, 
then, receive the grace of God which brings salvation, and 



228 BEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

be delivered from the fear of death, the cold grave, and 
the fearful punishment of those who know not God and 
obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ? Why not 
give your days of vigor, strength and health to that Lord 
who gave his life for you, that you might be happy here 
and happy in the eternal world? His love for you was, 
and is, stronger than death. His gospel is glad tidings 
well adapted to the case, circumstances, and condition of 
all. Assert your manhood ; stand up in the strength which 
God has given you, and declare for the great Captain of 
salvation. Christ will see of the travail of his soul and 
be satisfied, shining ranks of heavenly messengers will re- 
joice, and you will enter upon a life which will bring you 
great joy in this world, and in the world to come joy 
unspeakable and full of glory. 



CHAEA CTEEISTIC DISCO URSES. 229 



SERMON ON THE WORDS OF PETER. 

"For if ye do these things, ye shall never fall." — 2 Peter i. 10. 

The keys of the kingdom of heaven were given by the 
great Head of the Church to Simon, son of Jonah. At 
the proper time, in the wisdom of God, this man became 
an instrument through whom the Holy Spirit communi- 
cated the gospel of Christ, appended to which Avere the 
conditions of pardon, so far as men's activities were 
concerned. The great and glorious work in order 
to the salvation of a world lying in wickedness, was 
lain on the Son of the living God. He died fo?- our 
sins, according to the Scriptures; he w^as buried and rose 
again, according to the Scriptures. It is not our purpose 
on this occasion to say any thing about the philosophy of 
the necessity of Christ's death, in order to man's salvation, 
from the guilt, practice, power and punishment of sin ; 
nor yet hoio or in what icay God, man, angels and the 
whole universe were affected. These are deep, awful 
and grand mysteries, upon which we dare not presume to 
speculate noic. Christianity is an institution to be ac- 
cepted on the principle of faith, this depends upon tes- 
timony, this upon facts and tr-uths. Suffice it to say, then, 
we accept the apostle Peter as a guide in regard to salva- 
tion; not only as a guide, but as an infallible guide. 
No philosophy, no speculation, no metaphysical reason- 
ing are to be resorted to or indulged in. The words of 



230 BEmmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS, 

Peter, in tlieir fair, proper and obvious meaning are to 
be taken, acquiesced in^ acted upon, to be regarded as in- 
spired of God — not to be rejected, modified, or changed 
in the slightest degree. Peter was God's vicegerent, 
Christ's apostle, commissioned by him, sent out by his 
peerless authority, and the mouth-piece and honored 
instrument of the Holy Spirit. When he spake, it was 
God. When he commanded, it was God's command. 
When he exhorted and testified, it was the influence of 
the Holy Spirit shedding his divine and glorious light 
over the moral darkness of a sin-ruined, degraded and 
lost world. Peter was an embassador of the Lord of 
lords and King of kings. He spoke by the authority of 
heaven's imperial court. He spoke not as a mere man, 
but as God, Christ and the Holy Spirit. We elaborate 
this particular point, and call your attention solemnly 
to it. We do this because we know that it is not gen- 
erally looked at in its true light and from a proper stand- 
point. Reason, in many instances, or what is called 
reason, is frequently resorted to and substituted for faith. 
Reason itself, and in and of itself, is all right. But when 
one undertakes to set aside, ride over, and disregard /ac^s 
and truths, he may think he is guided by reason. He is, 
however, mistaken. He simply makes an effort at reason- 
ing, but fails — utterly fails — to reason. You may call it 
what you please, except reasoning. 

As an illustration of the fearful semi-infidelity under 
which men — good men, that is, well meaning men — labor 
in regard to the point under consideration, permit me to 
relate an occurrence which .came under my own personal 
observation. In the year eighteen hundred and thirty-six, 
I stopped at Brother Matthias Winans, in Jamestown, 
Green Co., Ohio. While sojonrning there a few days I 
held a discussion with a preacher, who was evidently 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 231 

God-fearing and honest in every respect. The question 
discussed "was the following: "Do faith, repentance and 
baptism, under the gospel dispensation, precede the re- 
mission of the past sins of the alien ?'^ We affirmed, he of 
course denied. In the afternoon of the second day of 
the debate, he arose to reply to my last speech, and said : 
"Peter was wrong on the day of Pentecost, but right at 
the house of Cornelius.'^ J^n^ow the wonder was, j)rovided 
Peter diifered from Peter, how any uninspired man, in 
modern days or in any other days, could tell on which 
occasion he was in error, and on which of the two occa- 
sions he was right. All I had to do was to show — by 
leaving out what Luke as a historian relates, besides 
what he said Peter spoke — that Peter preached and 
taught the same things substantially on both occa- 
sions. I then remarked that the debate must now close, 
as the issue was between the gentleman and Peter. If 
Peter was wrong so were we, and we were not there to 
prove Peter to be right. We might argue that question 
with an avowed infidel, but not with a professed minister 
of the gospel of Christ. So in this abrupt manner the 
debate closed. 

This serves to show how important it is to believe as ^Ye 
should believe. We are not saved by receiving that 
which we deduce from reasoning, but by receiving God^s 
revealed truth — truth to wdiich the highest reason of 
man never attained, yet not in opposition to reason. We 
do not argue that men are to do w^hat the Hicksite Quaker 
preacher said w^e ought to do : "' Abandon human reason, 
close your eyes to all external objects and your ears to 
all external sounds; turn your eyes inw^ardly, settle down 
in the quiet, and be obedient." No, no, we say ; let reason 
occupy its place, act in its own sphere, but let it not 
assume to set aside facts and demonstrated truths, as 



232 EEMimSCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

recorded in the Book of books. Peter is an infallible 
guide, and if he was Pope, the only one that was ever 
on earth. He had no predecessor, no successor. He used 
the keys of the kingdom, opened the door wide to Jew 
and Gentile, and did not transmit them to any one else. 
The door is still open, no man nor set of men can 
shut the door, or cause it even to grate on the hinges. Of 
the twain — that is, of Jews and Gentiles — there has 
been, and still is, one new man, all baptized into one 
body by the one Spirit. 

Taking it for granted that Peter is an infallible guide, 
then we can not go astray by following his instructions, 
whether given to saint or sinner or both. Let us look 
at the real merits of the question here presented : " But he 
that lacks these things'' — says he, that is, the things just 
mentioned by him — ^^is blind and can not see afar off, and 
has forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.'' 

It is a truism, that a person can not forget that which 
he never knew. That which one forgets is something 
which he knew before. To forget that one's old sins had 
been forgiven implies that he was once purged or for- 
given, and implies that the person knew it. 

We are brought to know some things one way and 
there are some things which we are brought to know in 
another way. I know that I am standing here. I know 
by consciousness that I am. I know I am not any- 
where else ; therefore, I am here. I know I am not 
sitting, lying, running nor walking, therefore I am 
standing, and, taking the two thercfores, I am standing 
here. I know this by personal experience, by coming in 
contact with the solid things of the material world, and 
by their affecting my own consciousness. 

I know there is a large extent of country known as 
South America. I was never in contact personally with 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 233 

any portion of it. I only believe that it did and does 
exist. This belief is the result of my confidence in what 
others have said who have come personally in contact 
with it. Notwithstanding I have not the evidence of my 
senses, still I am just as confident of the existence of 
South America as I am of my standing here. The drength 
of confidence is in proportion to the clearness and pos- 
itiveness of the testimony. Our confidence is strong 
when the testimony is abundant, clear and uncontra- 
dicted by any thing or any one. There is no ground 
for doubt, therefore, under the circumstances — there is no 
doubt. 

Whoever believes that he did receive the forgiveness 
or pardon of his old sins must, of necessity, believe 
upon testimony, that is, his believing this identical 
thing is, and necessarily must be, the result of some 
cause. God alone can forgive sins. God alone knows 
whether he has forgiven the sins of a particular indi- 
vidual or not, unless he has informed the individual of 
that fact, either directly or indirectly. Has God, under 
the gospel dispensation, said at any time, to any one. Thy 
sins are forgiven thee, by using words according to their 
commonly received sense? This I assume is not claimed 
by any one. How, then, does God make known to the 
pardoned sinner the fact of his forgiveness? Now, if 
we are not mistaken, the popular orthodox belief is that 
God, by his Holy Spirit, impresses this fact upon the 
soul without the medium of eyes or ears. He feels — has 
a consciousness — that his sins are pardoned. This con- 
viction, or internal evidence, is claimed to be the work 
of the Spirit of God; and, being the work of the 
Spirit, it may and can commence inwardly and work 
outwardly, as well as to commence outwardly and work 
inwardly. 
20 



234 EEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

All this we take to be sophistry, and the truth is, all 
this internal working is nothing more nor less than con- 
science. Adopting this rule for the evidence of the par- 
don of sins, it makes no difference what system of re- 
ligion one is under — Pagan, Jew or Mohammedan, nor 
to what sect of either — all that is necessary is that one be 
earnest and sincei'e. How consolatory to the sin-sick 
soul it is that the heavenly Father has given to a sin- 
ful world a positive institution, a significant institution, 
an appreciable, a cognizable institution; an institution 
which may be read and known of all men where he 
has pledged his ivor^d and honor, and confirmed by an 
oath his promise of the pardon of past sins. I need not 
say to this people, that positive institution is baptism. 

If the knowledge of the remission of past sins de- 
pended upon faith alone, how could we know when our 
faith appropriates the promise ? We have no way or 
means of measuring or weighing our faith but by its 
concomitants. Have we faith? Is it answered yes? 
Then, how much? Enough to appropriate the promise 
of the pardon of sins? Is it answered yes? If so, then 
another question. How do you know? Do you answer, 
I feel that my sins are pardoned? You know that 
feelings are the effect of cause. Now what was the 
cause? Was it that you believed with all your heart 
that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God? If yes, then 
another question, Have you not been believing that 
proposition for some time ? Is the answer yes ? Then, 
why were not your sins pardoned before? The truth is, 
you have imagined your sins pardoned; this imagining 
made you feel happy; the happy feelings you have 
taken as the evidence of the pardon of sins. Making the 
feelings both the cause and the effect, you reason in a 
vicious circle. The language of the great Teacher is 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 235 

this, as recorded by Mark, ^^He that believes and is 
baptized shall be saved; he that believes not shall be 
damned." 

This same apostle to the same people said, "There 
were eight souls saved by water; the like figure where- 
unto baptism doth also save us." These people believed, 
repented and were baptized. The knowledge of pardon 
to them was founded on God's promise to pardon on 
these conditions, which promise they relied on with- 
out doubting, and were perfectly conscious of their sub- 
mission to the requirement of God. Their faith was 
strong enough to lead to repentance ; their repentance 
that kind that eventuated in a change for the better; 
that change was proved to themselves by their willing- 
ness — their readiness to obey the first positive institution 
of God which lay before them. That institution was 
baptism. 

These are the propositions that are true, viz : under 
the gospel dispensation, faith is /o?-, that is, in order 
to, the remission of the past sins of the alien sinner. 

Second proposition — Repentance, under the gospel dis- 
pensation, is for, that is, in order to, the remission of the 
past sins of the alien. 

Third proposition — Baptism is for, that is, in order to, 
the remission of the past sins of the alien. 

These being true, there is a fourth proposition that is 
true, viz : faith, repentance and baptism are in order to 
the remission of sins. These four propositions being 
true, there are others true as logical sequences, viz: In 
the days of hale, unsophisticated Christianity, no disciple 
of Christ or Christian is known to have been baptized. 
The reason for this is : Baptism was ordained as the con- 
summating act of becoming a disciple of Christ. Then, 
as all the true disciples of Christ in primitive times were 



236 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

Christians (for the disciples were called Christians first at 
Antioch), no Christian man or woman is said to have 
been baptized. These all being true as words of holy 
writ^ it follows as clear as demonstration that nothing will 
unite the people who profess to be Christians and to love 
God but a return to primitive Christianity, ^^in word, in 
letter and in spirit.'^ ^' Like causes produce like effects, 
circumstances being equal,'' is a true maxim. 

We have thousands of brethren in the Lord, who are 
perfectly well satisfied that their sins were pardoned at 
the time they were buried with Christ in baptism. You 
had no satisfactory evidence that you were pardoned be- 
fore you were baptized, because you had no promise of 
God. When you were baptized you had the evidence. 
You believed God, and were made to rejoice in believ- 
ing. The great j^rincipky the lever power, is faith. Faith 
first, middle, last. Without tliis what could we do? Hoav 
could we appropriate the promises of God our heavenly 
Father? How kind in him to give us ordinances, that by 
faith in his Son we may move forward in obedience, and 
claim the promise! 

But Peter was writing to baptized believers who were 
still in a world of toil and sin and woe. He points them 
to higher circles, to the redeemed from all sorrow and 
sin. ^' If you do these things you shall never fall.'' He 
says an entrance shall be ministered to them into the 
everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
Christ. Yes, verily, an abundant entrance. 

First — Then we accept the apostle Peter as an infallible 
guide in regard to salvation from the guilt of sins past. 

Second — We accept him as an infallible teacher in 
regard to what we should do in order to eternal salva- 
tion — salvation from the punishment of sin, from corrup- 



CIIARACTEFxISTlC DISCOURSES, 237 

tion and mortality. " If ye do these things, ye shall 
never fall," etc. 

Third — We regaixl him as an infallible instructor in 
reference to the causes of present and eternal salvation. 
He told those to whom he wrote, that they were kept 
by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready 
to be revealed in the last time. 

He told tliem that they were redeemed by the precious 
blood of Christ — that they must give all diligence to 
make their calling and election sure. 

To those who were unpardoned, unsaved from sin, un- 
sanctified, unjustified, unadopted, and unreconciled, he 
said. Repent, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, 
and promised them the gift of the Holy Spirit. He 
commanded the fii'st Gentiles who were saved from sin to 
be baptized. He. commanded them in the name of the 
Lord Jesus to do so. Whosoever receives the teaching: 
of the Holy Spirit as uttered by the Apostle Peter, and 
continues steadfastly therein to the conclusion of his 
mortal career, shall be eternally saved. He can not be 
lost. Whosoever walks in the way thus pointed out by 
Peter, walks in the highw^ay which has been throvrn up 
for the redeemed of the Lord to walk in. 

In view, then, of the transitory nature of all the things 
of this sin-cursed earth; in view of the shortness of human 
life here; in view of the unending future; in view of the 
realms of eternal day; in view of the joys of redeemed 
humanity; in view^ of the dark, dreary and woeful condi- 
tion of the eternally damned and endlessly lost sinner, 
how consolatory, how pleasing to aspiring, thinking, long- 
ing, waiting, wishing pilgrims through this world, that 
God has given us men to speak and write who are infal- 
lible. How plainly we can see the good Providence of 
our Father in heaven preserving the divine records, and 



238 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS 

causing them to be transmitted from ages past to our times. 
Yes ; they have come down through bonjfires of books, 
through furious and devouring flames, through revoki- 
tions and counter revohitions, through falling and fallen 
kingdoms, empires and republics, through the long, dark 
night of error, superstition and ignorance. They may be 
a lamp to our feet and a light to our way; or we may 
prefer the flighting ign^s-fatui of human philosophy, and 
uncertain and of course unsatisfactory speculation. We 
may call the positive institution of baptism an emblem, 
a symbol, an outer sign of an inward grace, a mere ex- 
ternal ordinance, a non-essential. Remember, however, 
that it makes no difference what it may be called by mere 
uninspired men who presume to philosophize — it is /ar, 
in order to, the remission of sins. 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 239 



THE SEVEN UNITS. 

"I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy 
of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness 
with long-suftering, forbearing one another in love ; endeavoring to keep 
the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one 
Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling ; one Lord, one 
faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and 
through all, and in you all." — Ephesians iv. 1-6. 

The wise man said : " Wisdom hath builded her house, 
she hath hewn out her seven pillars, she hath sent forth 
her maidens." There are seven units presented in this 
portion of Scripture. There are six, to each of which we 
desire to call special attention; the seventh and last we 
do not propose to elaborate — " There is one God and 
Father of all.'^ This unit is an admitted truth, and 
therefore requires no argument, nor does it admit of any 
that could have any influence or effect upon that class of 
minds to which an argument on this question would be ap- 
plicable. Reason and argument are both lost on a fool. 
Who but " the fool hath said in his heart there is no 
God?" We propose to examine the remaining six units 
in the order in which they are presented. 

" There is one body." This is equivalent to saying 
there is one church, for ^^He is the head of the body, the 
church, who is the beginning, the first-born from the 
dead" (Col. i. 18). And '^ The husband is the head of 
the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church ; and He 
is the Saviour of the body" (Eph. v. 23). The one body, 
we see from these passages and from others we might 



240 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

quote, is the church — the one church of course ; for Christ 
not being the head of two or more bodies, He is not the 
head of two or more churches; but being the head oi one 
body, as the church is the body, it follows necessarily that 
the body is the church. JS'ow, ^^ Christ gave himself to 
sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the 
word^^ (Eph. v. 25, 26). All the members of necessity be- 
long to the body of which Christ is the head; and w^here, 
at this present day, after the lapse of eighteen hundred 
years, shall we find the body? There is one body — no 
more. Is the Roman Catholic hierarchy the one body? 
If it is, then all the members of the body of Christ be- 
long to the Roman Catholic Church. This admission, to 
which we are compelled by the power of axioms, excludes 
all Protestants, and includes Catholics only. Are w^e ready 
for this conclusion? for whether vv^e are or not, we are 
compelled to admit its correctness. To get rid of the con- 
clusion, we must set aside the premises, which is a diffi- 
cult task for any one to undertake. 

There is a body named the ^' Episcopal ChurchJ^ Is it 
the one body ? If it is, then in it are to be found all the 
members of the body, consequently all Catholics and all 
Protestants, except the Episcopalians, are excluded; for 
the same irresistible conclusion follows as in the case of 
the Roman Catholic body, it matters not what denomina- 
tion w^e designate as the one body. If we propose the 
Presbyterians, we exclude all the good Methodists. If 
we propose the Methodists, we exclude all the Presbyte- 
rians ; if the Baptists, we exclude all pedobaptists. It 
matters not which denomination we set up, we show our- 
selves to be uncharitable with regard to all others. There 
can be but one boclv. Now w4iat shall w^e do that we 
may exercise that heaven-born and from heaven-descended 
principle which thinketh no evil, is not easily provoked, 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 241 

that covereth a multitude of faults, and is the bond of per- 
fectness ? How shall our charity in this case be exercised ? 
Bigotry would set up each denomination as the one body, 
and the advocates and public teachers in each would cry 
out, " Come and join us, we constitute the body of Christ! " 
Love and good will say, " All the denominations in the 
aggregate constitute the one body ; join any one you 
please, make your own selection ; among so many you can 
surely find one to suit.'^ This may be a kind and benev- 
olent view of the matter ; but common sense steps in and 
asks questions which must be solved. You say among so 
many; so many what? So many branches of the church 
or body of Christ. Second question. Do you mean that the 
Romans, Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopa- 
lians, Baptists, etc., are branches? The answer will be 
in the affirmative. Then comes question third: Where is 
the church or body of which these are branches ? The 
answer will be, not to be seen, invisible. Question four — 
Are not these branches members of the church of Christ, 
which is the one body ? The answer is yes, and we have 
the following conclusion: The branches make up the 
entire whole; the branches are each and all visible, the 
whole invisible. This is a conclusion at which common 
sense revolts, and not only suspects, but is positively sure, 
that there is radical error somewhere in this reasoning. 
Full of the milk of human kindness, with a supreme re- 
gard for truth and reverence for the Word of God, we 
must look this matter full and square in the face, not in 
a dark corner, but in the light of day. If these denom- 
inations, in the aggregate, constitute the one body — 
Church, kingdom of Christ — then will it come to desola- 
tion, for it is divided. If they constitute the church, then 
indeed it is a ^^ militant ^^ church, or "church militant,'* 
for they are fighting. A house divided against itself will 
21 



242 BEinmSCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

fall. It can not stand — " a kingdom divided against 
itself will come to desolation/' 

In view of this difficulty, it is argued that the denomi- 
nations are only contending with one another in regard 
to church politics and church policies; that there are 
persons in all of them that are good, and some that 
are bad ; but that all of the denominations hold to vital 
godliness, and are perfectly agreed as to the essentials 
of religion. Then the difficulty is in regard to non- 
essentials ; and, whenever these are laid aside, all denomi- 
nationalism and strife will disappear and trouble the 
church no more ; the invmble church will become visible, 
and "emerge from the wilderness leaning upon her be- 
loved," and her aspect will be " fair as the moon, clear 
as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners." The 
shepherds who have headed each his little flock will see 
their error in preventing the sheep from running to- 
gether; there will be a glad union, and "one fold and 
one shepherd." 

Now, we shall always be in trouble and doubt about 
sects, denominations and sectarianism, until we go far 
enough back chronologically to be entirely out of sight 
of all denominations of professed Christians — Roman 
Catholic, Protestant, Greek and Latin. This carries us 
back to the time when the apostle wrote this epistle to 
the church at Epliesus. Yea, and beyond that time; for 
years prior to the date of this letter, a church of Christ 
had been constituted at Ephesns, and all the elements 
necessary to constitute such a church were possessed 
by the Ephesian saints, for Paul addressed them as 
"the saints at Ephesus." He does not address them 
as a Roman Catholic Church ; not as an Episcopalian, 
Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist nor Lutheran church. 
Every body knows that there existed a good reason why ; 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 243 

these denominational distinctions are of comparatively 
recent date, and were wholly unknown to Paul and 
to his co-laborers in primitive times. They should be 
equally out of the question with us in the investigation 
of this interesting and all-important theme. Modern 
sects and denominations are a stumbling-block in the way 
of sinners. Many nowadays, instead of inquiring of 
the apostles what they shall do to be saved, and listening 
with intensest interest for an answer from an apostle's 
lips, are wondering what church they ought to join. 
"I have a notion," says one, "to join the Presbyterian 
church.'' Says another, " I have thought of attaching 
myself to the Methodist Episcopal Church." Every body 
knows that each of these persons has an idea of doing 
something which differs from the other. Every body 
ought to know that every one who became a member 
of the one body of which Paul speaks, did the same 
things that every other person did. The question is not, 
or should not be, Which is the most respectable church, 
in the estimation of those of the best information and 
taste in the neighborhood ; but, What must I do to be 
saved f We must, if we would be disenthralled from 
sectarianism and denominationalism, go out of their 
reach, go back and live, in a period Avhen they were not 
yet born. Our inquiries for the one body should be 
where we are sure to find it; and if we go back to the 
time when there was but one body, we are certain to 
escape all confusion in the matter. We must get en- 
tirely beyond the apostasy, and live, as it were, in an 
era when the love of the Lord Jesus Christ, and a fixed 
determination to serve him in all things, rose high 
above all party spirit and human philosophy. 

There is one body, and only one ; and none of the 
modern sects can claim to be that body in any fair- 



244 BE^IINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

ness or any proper regard for the truth. It differs from 
the Roman Catholics and all modern sects. Jesus the 
Christ, the Son of the living God, is the head of this one 
body, ^4n whom all the building'^ (using another figure) 
" fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in 
the Lord.'' 

Second unit — "There is one Spirit.'^ Every body that 
is alive is animated by whatsoever spirit is peculiar to 
him, and the body of Christ is animated by the Holy 
Spirit. This is not the spirit of party, or a mere party 
spirit wliich possesses each rival sect and stimulates each 
to vrork for its own interest and aggrandizement as an- 
tagonistic to all other sects and denominations. The 
Holy Spirit has ranked sects in the catalogue of mortal 
sins — in the dark list of crimes that are in their nature 
damning. God the Father is revealed to us in the 
Holy Scriptures, so also is Christ, the Son of the Father, 
and in the same Scriptures the Holy Spirit has revealed 
himself to us. What can we, in truth, say of the Holy 
Spirit, except what we have learned, directly or indi- 
rectly, from the words of the Spirit contained in the 
Scriptures of truth? We are there taught in regard to 
the Holy Spirit, that he inspired the Jewish prophets, so 
that w4ien they spake they gave no uncertain, ambigu- 
ous oracle. In this way they were enabled to foretell 
the fate of families, individuals, cities, towns, nations and 
empires. They foretold the coming of the Just One, the 
great Messiah — his birth, the place of his birth, his life, 
his death, and the glory that should follow the tragic 
event. This was inspiration by the Holy Spirit. Christ 
received the Holy Spirit without measure, by which he 
wrought many signs and wonders. He cast out demons, 
healed malignant diseases, and seemed to carry all power 
in his mere volition. He rebuked the tempest, and bid 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 245 

the storm subside ; and, facing death, bade him release 
his victim, and called forth the sleeping tenant of the 
gi'ave. This was the manifestation of power. 

While his personal mission was to the Jews only — '^I 
am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel '^ — 
he chose men Avhom he denominated apostles, because he 
sent them. To them he intrusted the secrets of the reign 
of heaven, and to them he communicated the things that 
they were, subsequent to his departure, to preach and 
teach in all the world. But that these men might be 
qualified for the execution of their work, they were to be 
under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Their own natural 
endowments and acquirements Avould not be sufficient for 
the great work in which they were to be engaged, and 
which they were to accomplish. They were promised by 
the Saviour the Holy Spirit in a miraculous degree: 
"Nevertheless, I tell you the truth; It is expedient for 
you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter 
will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him 
unto you. And when he is come, he will reprove the 
world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: of 
sin, because they believe not on me ; of righteousness, 
because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more ; of 
judgment, because the prince of this w^orld is judged. I 
have yet many things to say unto you, but you can not 
bear them now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, 
is come, he will guide you into all truth ; for he shall 
not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that 
shall he speak: and he will show you things to come. 
He shall glorify me : for he shall receive of mine, and 
shall show it unto you"' (John xvi. 7-14). The idea is 
popular, and preached and taught every-where, that this 
promise of the Spirit was made to mankind generally and 
indiscriminately, and that after ages, as well as the time 



246 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

tlien present, were embraced in the promise. This is 
clearly erroneous, as is evident from the following lan- 
guage of the Saviour : " If ye love me, keep my com- 
mandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give 
you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for- 
ever; even the Spirit of truth, whom the world can not 
receive" (John xiv. 15-17). It will be observed that 
Christ here speaks to the apostles, and makes the promise 
of the Comforter to them exclusively, and that he speaks 
of the Spirit of truth whom the world can not receive. 
The apostles alone had this promise, and it can not, with 
a due regard to the fair construction of language, apply to 
others; and it is af&rmed by the Saviour that the woi^ld 
can not receive it, and therefore the application of the 
promise indiscriminately to the world is evidently errone- 
ous. Again, Jesus told the apostles to tarry at Jerusalem 
till they should receive the Holy Spirit, which he prom- 
ised to send them: ^^And, being assembled together with 
them, commanded them that they should not depart from 
Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, 
saith he, ye have heard of me. For John truly baptized 
with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy 
Ghost not many days hence" (Acts i. 4, 5). Again the 
Saviour speaks of the time and place when and where this 
promise should be fulfilled: "Then opened he their un- 
derstanding, that they might understand the Scriptures; 
and said unto them. Thus it is written, and thus it be- 
hooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the 
third day; and that repentance and remission of sins 
should be preached in his name among all nations, be- 
ginning at Jerusalem" (Luke xxiv. 45-47). 

We read in the second chapter of Acts of the Apostles, 
that " There came a sound from heaven as of a rushing 
mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they (the 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 247 

apostles) were sitting. Ami there appeared unto them 
cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of 
them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, 
and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave 
them utterance " (Acts ii. 2-4.) On this day, and at Je- 
rusalem, the promised Comforter came to the apostles, and 
by him they spake, that is, " the Spirit gave them utter- 
ance." The Spirit used their organs of speech, and spoke 
to the jxiople. The papular idea is, that when the Holy 
Spirit came on the day of Pentecost, he entered into the 
minds and hearts of the multitude, and in some secret 
and mysterious manner changed their hearts and regen- 
erated them. Hence we often hear men pray for a " pen- 
tecostal shower" to come down upon the people and con- 
vert them. It needs but a careful reading of the account 
given by Luke, to demonstrate that such a prayer is 
founded upon an erroneous conception of the scene that 
transpired on the day of Pentecost. Let us carefully 
analyze the passage — at least so much as is necessary to a 
proper conception of the facts and truths therein de- 
veloped, and not catch up things second hand, and hold 
to them, right or wrong. We observe, first, in the analysis 
of the passage, they (the apostles) spake as the Spirit gave 
them utterance ; second, when this w^as noised abix)ad 
(that is, the report of the occurrence of the stupendous 
miracle in the house where the apostles were sitting 
was noised abroad) and was reported through the city, 
the multitude came together. Now we have the audience 
gathered to the place, but nobody converted and added 
to the church though the miraculous descent of the Holy 
Spirit has occurred, and no one^s sins yet forgiven. But 
when the crowd were gathered to the place, they consti- 
tuted a congregation of unsaved, unpardoned sinners. 
The Holy Spirit had not fallen upon them. No cloven 



248 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

tongues of lambent flame are reported to have sat npon 
this motly crowd at any time. They were assembled to 
hear whatever was to be heard, and to see w^hatever was 
to be seen. The Holy Spirit, then, by the mouth of Peter, 
preached the facts and truths of the gospel, convincing 
many hearers of sin, of the righteousness of Jesus whom 
they had crucified and slain, and of the judgment of the 
prince of this world ; that the great Messiah had entered 
the dark territory of death, grappled with him that had 
the power of death, and triumphed gloriously over him 
and all his squalid hosts. It was not possible that he 
should be holden of death. He was the Holy One, and 
saw not corruption. God raised him from the dead, and 
seated him at his own right hand in the heavens. The 
crowd heard, trembled, Avere pricked in their hearts, and 
cried out to Peter and the rest of the apostles, ^' Men and 
brethren, what shall we do?" The answer was, "Pepent, 
and be baptized eveiy one of you in the name of Jesus 
Christ, for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the 
gift of the Holy Spirit." After many words of exhorta- 
tion to the multitude, it is said : '^As many as received his 
word gladly were baptized; and there were added to them 
that day about three thousand souls." 

By examination of the matter now introduced, we learn 
that there are different manifestations of the Holy Spirit. 
First, that of wisdom, by which the prophets and apostles 
spoke ; second, that of power, by which Christ and the 
apostles wrought miracles ; third, that of goodness, which 
all receive who obey the gospel — "We are witnesses of 
these things, so also is the Holy Spirit, which God gives 
to them that obey him " (Acts v. 32) ; " Because ye are 
sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your 
hearts, crying, Abba, Father " (Gal. iv. 6) ; "After that ye 
believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise ^' 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 249 

(Eph. i. 13); '^ The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, 
long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, tem- 
perance" (Gal. V. 22. 23). The Holy Spirit Avas not or- 
dinarily given so as to enable the person to prophesy nor 
to work miracles, but in such degree as to comfort and 
console the obedient believer. In this degree, all the dis- 
ciples of Christ receive and enjoy the gift of the Holy 
Spirit by faith. 

This is the one Spirit which dwells in and animates the 
one body, the Church, of which Christ is the Supreme 
Head. They who desire to enjoy the consoling influence 
of the one Spirit can do so by becoming attached to the 
one body. 

''Even as ye are called in one hope of your calling,'' 
is the third item. All the primitive Christians had the 
same hope. It was a lively hope, brought to them by the 
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to a glorious 
state of immortality. (See Rom. viii. 22, 23; 1 John iii. 
1, 2; Heb. vi. 18, 19; 1 Peter i. 3, 4.) This hope ani- 
mated, cheered and comforted the suffering primitive 
Christians in all their sorrow and affliction, which, to 
many, were very great. Peter required the brethren to 
be ready to give to every one that asked a reason of the 
hope that was in them, with meekness and fear. They 
who would enjoy this hope, may do so by becoming mem- 
bers of the one body. Without this hope, which is an 
anchor to the soul both sure and steadfast, this world is 
truly a wilderness of woe. The things of time are of 
transient duration, and the grave lies before the footsteps 
of every son of Adam. Its gloom can be cheered by the 
hope which we are begotten to by the coming forth of the 
Lord Jesus Christ from the tomb, and there is no other 
ray of light shining upon the grave. 

" One Lord." This is the fourth unit in this catalogue. 



250 BE^flNISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

The primitive Christians bowed to and acknowledged the 
autliority of one Lord, and no more. In the heathen 
w^orld there were that were called lords many and gods 
many. Christians believed in one God, the Father, by 
whom were all things, and one Lord Jesus Christ, in 
whom were all things. The inspired apostles did not 
explain, nor attempt to explain, the nature — the essential 
nature — of God. This could not be done, and, no doubt, 
furnished the reason for their never attempting to do it. 
They entered into no metaphysical discussion of the ques- 
tion of the relation of the Father and the Son back in the 
interminable ages of eternity. They asserted that Jesus 
is the Christ, the Son of the living God. They affirmed 
this proposition wherever they preached. Mary was the 
mother, God the Father of the Man Christ Jesus. He 
was Immanuel, which means God-man, or, rather, God in 
man — God and man united. God manifest in the flesh 
was what they saw who saw Jesus of Nazareth. Those 
who stood around the cross on which the glorious Sufferer 
died, saw the death, not of a mere man, buf the Lord 
from heaven. "The first man was of the earth, earthy; 
the second man is the Lord from heaven.'^ That Jesus 
was both God and man is a truth, and a mysterious truth, 
none in the universe more mysterious. The angels beheld 
with wonder and astonishment the assumption of man- 
hood on the part of the Logos, who was "in the begin- 
ning,^^ who Avas " with God,'' and who " was God.'' Paul, 
in one of his letters to Timothy, remarks: ",Great is the 
mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, jus- 
tified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gen- 
tiles, believed on in the w^orld, received up into glory" 
(1 Tim. iii. 16). We know nothing concerning Christ save 
what the Scriptures teach. Concerning him, outside of 
the sacred record, all is silent as the shades of death. But 



CHAR A CTERISTIC DISCO UESES. 251 

in that record he is proved, by signs and wonders and 
divers miracles, to be what he claimed for himself — the 
Son of the Father in truth and in love, and Lord of all. 
In fashion as a man, he died a shameful death, even the 
death of the cross. But he hath a name which is above 
every name ; that at the name of Jesus every knee should 
bow and every tongue confess that he is Lord, to the glory 
of God the Father. In all the plantations of God, in 
all the illimitable universe, in all the ranks on ranks of 
created intelligences, among principalities and powers, 
thrones and dominions, he hath no peer but the mighty 
God of the universe. He died once in meekness. He 
suffered unutterable sorrow, and felt the deepest and most 
excruciating torture ; but now he is King of kings and 
Lord of lords. He dieth no more. He holds the keys of 
death and Hades, he opens and no man can shut, he shuts 
and no man can open. Who of us all can refrain from 
loving, honoring him? AVho refuse to acknowledge his 
lordship? Who refuse to become the disciple of the 
mighty Conqueror, the victor over death, hell and the 
grave, and the giver of eternal life to those who follow 
him to the hour of complete redemption? Where are the 
generals, captains, heroes and victors whose names are 
emblazoned on the page of ancient history? Where are 
the Hannibals, Alexanders, Caesars, Pompeys, Ciceros 
and Demostheneses? Long since they slept the sleep of 
death, and the grim tyrant holds them in his iron grasp, 
powerless and silent. All the ancient philosophers, poets, 
sages, statesmen, heroes, victors, orators and historians, 
who have been honored while living, and embalmed in 
the memories of thousands when dead, sleep in the man- 
sions of silence in the shades of the tomb. But where is 
this one Lord? Is he held in the cold grasp of death? 
Oh, no; long ago the acclaim was heard from the palace 



252 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

royal of the universe: "Lift np your heads, O ye gates; 
and be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors ; and the King 
of glory shall come in. 

'^Who is this King of glory? 

"The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in 
battle. 

" Lift up your heads, O ye gates ; even lift them up, ye 
everlasting doors ; and the King of glory shall come in. 

" Who is this King of glory ? 

"The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory." 

Again we ask. Who would not love and obey him? 

If we do not honor him from love, we shall certainly 
bow the knee before his awful majesty when he shall 
show to an astonished universe Avho is the only potentate, 
when his enemies shall be shivered and broken as a pot- 
ter's vessel is broken. 

This one Lord, and no other, was acknowledged by 
the primitive Christians. It is an honor, privilege, right 
and happiness to unite with the primitive saints and 
martyrs in acknowledging the claims, submitting to the 
authority, and obeying the commands of this one glori- 
fied Lord. All should be ready to sing with the Spirit 
and the understanding : 

" No other Lord but thee we'll know, 

No other power but thine confess; 
We sing thine honor while below, 

And heaven shall hear us shout thy grace.". 

^^ One faith'' is the fifth unit in the platform — one faith, 
no more. In modern theology there is more than one 
faith. There is historical faith, evangelical faith, saving 
faith, speculative faith, etc., etc. JSTow, these distinctions 
really exist, but we have no use for any but one, because 
the divine platform contains but one. That is no doubt 
the one to which the adjectives saving, evangelical and his- 
14 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 253 

torical may with propriety be prefixed, and yet it does 
not follow, as a consequence, that we have as many Jdnds 
of faith as we have adjectives. To suppose so is an 
error, and leads to much confusion and doubt. Take, 
for instance, the word historiG and prefix it to faith, and 
then, taking the word evangelical, prefix it in the same 
way, and say there are two kinds of faith, the former 
kind not saving, tlie latter kind saving. Then the ques- 
tion arises in the mind, Am I in possession of evangel- 
ical faith or do I possess historic faith only ? Let us 
examine : Historic means pertaining to history. History 
comes to us in words, either spoken or written. Evan- 
gelical is a mysterious thing — Divine ; and, when made 
a prefix to faith, it describes the kind of faith, and 
means that sort which comes into the heart by the direct 
operation of the Holy Spirit, and is generally imparted 
to the soul after long and wrestling prayer. ^^Now," 
says the examiner of himself, ^^I think I have no faith 
except historic; that kind is not saving, and, of course, 
I can not be saved by it. It avails me nothing; there- 
fore I shall wait until I get evangelical faith, and, that 
being saving, I shall be saved by it, and without it I 
am lost.'' Ten chances to one he becomes an infidel, 
abandons himself to sin and the commission of crimes, 
waxes worse and worse, and becomes irrecoverable : 
^^Ephraim is joined to his idols, let him alone.'' How 
much better to look at the subject in the light of com- 
mon sense. What is the meaning of evangelical? It 
simply means that which is according to the gospel. 
Then, of course, evangelical faith is that which is ac- 
cording to the gospel — no more, no less. What is his- 
toric? That which is according to history, of course. 
Is the gospel reduced to history ? Certainly ; it comes 
to us by the use of words either spoken or written. 



254 EEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

The sacred writings of evangelists and apostles abound 
in the book known by the title "The New Testament 
OF OUR Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ/^ and in 
it is contained the ancient gospel. In PauPs day, for a 
time the gospel was oral and preached by himself and 
others. In our day it is found in the record and not 
elsewhere. Therefore, from the premises, we deduce the 
following : saving faith is evangelical faith ; evangelical 
faith is historic faith ; and saving faith, evangelical faith 
and historic faith are the same one faith. These ad- 
jectives, evangelical, saving and historic, qualify the 
same noun, not three nouns. Contemplated in one as- 
pect, we may say saving faith with propriety, because 
it is a faith which saves, and without it there is no sal- 
vation: "He that believeth not shall be condemned'^ 
(Mark xvi. 16). We may with equal propriety say 
evangelical faith; because saving faith is that which is 
according to the gospel — no other faith is saving — and 
we may say also historic faith ; because there is no other 
kind known to humanity, and because especially is evan- 
gelical saving faith historical. Hear John the apostle : 
" Many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of 
his disciples, which are not written in this book : but 
these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the 
Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have 
life through his name " (John xx. 30, 31). 

Secondly, what is the object of this one faith? Is it 
the assent of the mind to a string of propositions called 
articles of religion, or articles of faith ? Nine, fifteen, 
twenty-five or thirty-nine articles? Nay, verily; the ob- 
ject of the one faith is the one Lord. The one faith is 
confidence in him as the Son of God and the only 
Saviour of sinners. "This is the victory that overcomes 
the world, even our faith. And who is he that overcomes 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 255 

the world, but he that believes that Jesus is the Son of 
God?'' (1 John V. 4, 5). "Whosoever believeth that 
Jesus is the Christ is born (begotten) of God '' (1 John 
V. 1). Again, that the one faith is not something that 
enters the heart by some mysterious operation of the 
Spirit, Avithout the intervention of eyes or ears, is ob- 
vious from what Paul says in the tenth chapter of 
Romans, "How then shall they call on him in whom 
they have not believed? and how shall they believe in 
him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they 

hear without a preacher? So then faith 

cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God/' 
Yes, by hearing the word of God. Not by hearing 
something else, not by a still small voice, nor by a small 
still voice that says nothing; but by the voice of God, 
speaking to us in the sacred Scriptures, in primitive 
times speaking orally by the illustrious apostles of the 
Son of God. He that possesses this one faith has the 
lever that may raise him from earth to heaven — from a 
mortal, sinful state to a glorious immortality. There is 
one proviso : This one faith must be obeyed, otherwise it is 
unavailing. Faith without works is dead, being alone. 
It neither saves from sin here, nor in the future state 
without being obeyed. It was the original intention of 
God to save those who have faith, provided that they 
obey it. Rom. xvi. 25, 26 ; Gal. iii. 2. That Christ is 
the object of true Christian faith, saving faith, evangelical 
faith is clear to all who will examine the subject with 
an eye single to know, and not be mistaken : " Be- 
lievest thou on the Son of God? Lord, who is he, that 
I may believe on him ? I that speak unto thee am he. 
Lord, I believe." This is faith, and the one faith; 
obey, it and all is right. 

In reference to faith, there is one fact of great impor- 



256 IlE3nmSCENCES AND IKCIDENTS. 

tance to know and remember, l^o one ever asked the 
Saviour or the apostles what faith is. This shows that 
the word was used and understood in its commonly 
received sense. In common parlance^ faith is the mind's 
perception of the truth of a proposition advanced by 
another, the truth of which we do not know by intui- 
tion. We credit the statement. We receive the testi- 
mony as true. Little children learn the names of the 
letters of the alphabet by faith. They believe the name 
of each letter to be what their teacher says it is. Saving 
faith, the one faith, is not the belief of a proposition in 
natural philosophy or agriculture. It is not to believe 
that this, that, 'or the other noted historical character once 
lived and died, and not even to believe that Jesus of 
Nazareth once lived in Judea, and was crucified under 
Pontius Pilate. The proposition is, Jesus of Nazareth 
IS THE Sox OF THE LIVING GoD, the Only Saviour of 
lost sinners. This proposition received into the heart, 
fully and without any reserve, fills it full of love and 
joy. All the primitive Christians possessed this faith, 
and Paul says "there is one faith.'^ 

Sinner, believest thou on the Son of God? If so, obey 
thy faith, and it will be made alive; thou shalt overcome 
the world. Without obedience, thy faith will avail noth- 
ing. The devils believe that Christ ic the Son of God, 
and tremble. " If ye love me, keep my commandments.'' 

The sixth plank in this divine platform is, "There is 
ONE baptism." Yes, just one, and one only. We now 
propose to examine the Scriptures of truth to ascertain 
what this one baptism is. We read in the Scriptures of 
the baptism of the Holy Spirit, of the baptism of fire, of 
the baptism of sufferings, and of baptism in water. Now 
the inquiry is, which of these is the unit placed in the 
platform in connection with the other six units? It can 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES. 257 

not be the baptism in fire mentioned in third chapter of 
Matthew, because that baptism applies to the wicked, as 
is evident from the figures employed by John : " I indeed 
baptize you with water unto repentance; but he that 
Cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not 
worthy to bear : he shall baptize you with the Holy 
Ghost and with fire : whose fim is in his hand, and he 
will thoroughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat 
into the garner ; but he will burn up the chaff with un- 
quenchable fire'^ (Matt. iii. 11, 12). There are two 
classes of character here — those who bring forth fruit 
meet for repentance, and those who claim blessings and 
privileges on the principle of birth — natural birth — 
without repentance. This latter class are compared to 
chaff, which shall be burned up with unquenchable fire. 
They are the wricked and finally impenitent who shall be 
baptized with fire. 

Secondly, there is the baptism of the Holy Spirit. 
The wicked were never baptized in the Holy Spirit, and 
but two plain and clear cases are recorded in the sacred 
writings of the baptism of any one in the Holy Spirit. 
The first case is in the second chapter of the Acts of 
Apostles, the second in the tenth. Let us examine these 
two occurrences. This, to our mind, is better done by 
observing the language of Peter in the eleventh chapter 
of Acts than any other way. Peter is telling his brethren 
what occurred at the time he was at the house of Cor- 
nelius: "And as I began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell 
on them as on us at the beginning. Then remembered 
I the word of the Lord, how that he said, John indeed 
baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the 
Holy Ghost." Now, from this language Ave learn that 
while Christ was with the apostles he said, "ye shall be 
baptized wdth the Holy Spirit.^^ Secondly, we learn that 
22 



258 REMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

the baptism of the Holy Spirit occurred at the house of 
Cornelius. This we learn from the fact that the occur- 
rence brought to Peter's recollection what the Lord had 
said in regard to the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Thirdly, 
we learn that they were baptized at the house of Cor- 
nelius, just as they were ^^at the beginning.'^ "And as I 
began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us 
at the beginning '^ (Acts xi. 15). Here are, then, two 
clear cases of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I am not 
certain that any other instance is on record. I will not 
be positive, as it makes no difference in this investigation 
whether there are any other instances or not. One thing 
is certain, neither baptism in fire nor in the Holy Spirit 
is the one baptism mentioned by Paul. Baptism is a 
command, and the apostles were commanded to baptize, 
but they could not baptize with the Holy Spirit, for this 
was the prerogative of Christ. The power to baptize 
with the Holy Spirit was not delegated to any man or to 
any set of men. In Matt, xxviii. 19, 20, we read the 
last great commission of this one Lord to his apostles, 
as recorded by one of them: "All power (authority) is 
given unto me in heaven and on earth. Go ye therefore, 
teach (matheeteusate) all nations, baptizing them into 
(eis) the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy 
Spirit: teaching (didaskontes) them to observe all 
things whatsoever I have commanded you; and, lo, I am 
with you alway, even to the end of the world.'' The 
apostles were to execute this commission. They were 
commanded to teach and to baptize. But they could not 
baptize in the Holy Spirit. They must have baptized 
in something else. What was it? Peter commanded 
the people on the day of Pentecost to repent and be bap- 
tized. Repentance is commanded, so also is baptism, in 
tae same sentence; but to obey the command to be bap- 



CHABACTEEI&TIC DISCO URSES. 259 

tized with the Holy Spirit is impossible; therefore it 
was with something else. In the tenth of Acts, we learn 
what they were baptized in: '^ While Peter yet spake 
these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard 
the word. And they of the circumcision which believed 
were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because 
that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the 
Ploly Ghost. For they heard them speak with tongues, 
and magnify God. Then answered Peter, Can any man 
forbid water- that these should not be baptized, which 
have received the Holy Ghost as well as we? And he 
commanded them to be baptized in the name of the 
Lord" (Acts x. 44-47). He commanded them to be bap- 
tized after the Holy Spirit had fallen on them. "Can 
any man forbid water?" inquired Peter. He mentioned 
water for the purpose of baptism, and refers to the fact 
of the Holy Spirit's falling upon them as a reason why 
no man should object to their being baptized in icater. 
We have already shown that Peter regarded the circum- 
stance of the descent of the Holy Spirit upon them as 
the baptism in the Holy Spirit. Instead, therefore, of 
the baptism of the Holy Spirit in any case being a reason 
why there is no necessity for baptism in water, it appears 
that the contrary is the truth, " Can any man forbid 
water ? " etc. The eunuch said to Philip : " See, here 
is icater, what hinders me to be baptized?" The one 
baptism is doubtless the baptism in water w^hich the 
apostles commanded, and which they practiced, in pur- 
suance of the commission. One Lord and one baptism, 
and that in water. 

Having ascertained, beyond all reasonable doubt, that 
water baptism is the one baptism referred to in the pas- 
sage, the next inquiry shall be for the purpose of learning 
what the action is. 



260 EEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENTS. 

There are three things called baptism by the popular 
preachers of the day, viz : Sprinkling and pouring water 
upon a person^ and immersion in water. These three can 
not be one and the same. No child ten years old can be 
made to believe that these are one. Take^ for instance, a 
supposable circumstance : A Methodist preacher, we will 
say, has a number of subjects to baptize. He says to A, 
"By what mode do you choose to be baptized?" A an- 
swers, '' By sprinkling." He propounds the same ques- 
tion to B, and receives for answer, "By pouring." In 
reply to the same question, C answers, "By immersion." 
The preacher sprinkles some water upon A, pours some on 
B — using the formula in Matt, xxviii. 19. "Now," says 
he, " we will repair to the water and immerse Mr. C, who 
has made choice of that mode of Christian baptism." 
They then leave the house, go to some stream or pool, 
and the preacher immerses Mr. C, repeating the formula. 
Ask the boy of good sense, that is but ten years old, 
whether the preacher did the same thing in every case. 
The unsophisticated boy will answer no. The boy knows, 
and every body else knows, that he did three things, and a 
different thing with each of the candidates. Furthermore, 
if there had not been three things to be done, how could 
there be a choice made by every one of the three persons? 
And we see that no two of them made choice of the same 
thing. "But," says an objector, "you forget that these 
three actions are but three modes of doing the same thing; 
that is, three modes of baptism." To this objector we say, 
then what is baptism itself? The modes of doing a thing 
and the thing itself are not identical — not the same thing. 
Then it follows that the phrase, " modes of baptism/^ is fal- 
lacious ; because it is said by the same class of objectors, 
that sprinkling by a proper administrator upon a proper 
subject in the name of the Trinity is baptism, and so of 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCO URSES, 26 1 

pouring and immersion. Then, if each of the two former 
is baptism, neither can be a mode of baptism, being bap- 
tism itself. How can the two be one, and yet each only a 
mode of the same thing"? Then, what is immersion? It 
must be a mode of sprinkling, if sprinkling is baptism, 
also a mode of pouring, if pouring is baptism. This 
thing of ''modes of baptism ^^ is a miserable sophism that 
many preachers have been deceived by without knowing 
it, and they have imjx)sed the same deception upon thou- 
sands of others. The truth is that baj^tism is an Angli- 
cized Greek word — its equivalent in pure English being 
dip or immerse. Philip and the eunuch both went down 
into the water, and ''he baptized him." They came up 
out of the w^ater, both Philip and the eunuch. No one 
believes that they went down into the water that Philip 
might sprinkle water upon him. Then that immersion or 
dipping is equivalent to baptism is plain from what Paul 
says in Romans vi. 4 : " Therefore we are buried with him 
by baptism into death;" and also in Col. ii. 12: "Buried 
w^ith him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him 
through the faith of the operation of God," 

Baptism is a burial ; but one can not be buried by 
having a little water sprinkled upon him ; therefore the 
sprinkling of water upon one is not baptizing him. 

Again, baptism is a burial ; but one is not buried by 
pouring a little water upon him ; therefore pouring a little 
water upon one is not baptizing him. 

Baptism is that by which one can be buried. One can 
be buried by being immersed in water; therefore immers- 
ing or dipping is baptizing. Baptism is immersion, and 
therefore immersion is baptism. Two words for the same 
thing — one word in one language, and one word in an- 
other : this is the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, 
on the question, "What is baptism ? 



262 EEMINISCENCES AND INCIDENl-S. 

Having ascertained what the one baptism is, we next 
inquire what it is for. The people of to-day have various 
views touching the design of this institution. For this 
reason, it is of great moment that we go back of all 
modern thoughts and views concerning the design of 
baptism. The Baptists immerse the candidates because 
their sins are pardoned and they are regenerated. They 
regard baptism as a command to be obeyed by a child of 
God, by one adopted into the family of God. Those who 
sprinkle water on adults and on children do it for various 
reasons. All, however, regard their doings in this regard 
as obeying the Saviour in baptism. The design of the 07ie 
baptism, which, in plain English, is the immersion of the 
penitent believer into the name of the Father, the Son and 
the Holy Spirit, is /or, in order to, the remission of sins — 
" He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved ; but he 
that believeth not shall be damned" (Mark xvi. 16). See 
also Acts ii. 38; Acts xxii. 16. 

Let us look for a moment at the import of the phrase, 
" For the remission of sins." In Matthew xxvi. 28 : 
" For this is my blood of the New Testament, which is 
shed for many for the remission of sins.'' In Acts ii. 38, 
we find precisely the same phrase : " Repent, and be bap- 
tized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, 
and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." ^o one 
doubts that the phrase in Matt. xxvi. 28 is equivalent to, 
in order to remission, etc., and not to because of, etc. 
So in Acts ii. 38, the phrase is the same, and evidently has 
the same meaning. In the first place, the blood of Christ 
procures remission of sins for many; in the second place, 
baptism secures remission of sins to the believing penitent 
who obeys the command to be baptized. 

We have now briefly, very briefly, examined these seven 
units, which, as ground, basis, or platform of union dis- 



CHARACTERISTIC DISCOURSES. 263 

tinguished the primitive Christians from all other parties 
in religion, whether Jewish or Pagan. A restoration 
of primitive Christianity, a recognition of, and adherence 
to, these seven capital units by those who profess to fol- 
low Christ, will, of necessity, annihilate all sects and 
denominations. 

Let others do as they may, each of us should say, I will 
do what I can to accomplish so glorious a consummation as 
the demolition of sects and sectarianism, that the Church 
of the living God may again appear as " fair as the moon, 
as clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners." 



264 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 



JOHISr P. MITCHELL. 



JoHX Packer Mitchell, son of Nathan J. and Sarah 
B. Mitchell, was born in Howard, Centre County, Pa., on 
the second day of May, in the year of our Lord one 
thousand eight hundred and forty-three. He received an 
excellent common school education in the vicinity of his 
native place; became proficient in all the branches: 
taught reading, writing, arithmetic, English grammar, the 
elements of algebra, natural philosophy, physiology, analy- 
sis of the English language, and geography. Then he 
went to Dickinson Seminary at Williamsport, Pa., and en- 
tered upon the study of the classics and other branches 
of science. Leaving the seminary, he studied laAV with 
John H. Orvis, Esq., Bellefonte, Pa., Here he was ad- 
mitted to the bar and entered upon the duties of his pro- 
fession. He soon began to be admired for his ability and 
great candor as counsel and advocate. Before he was ad- 
mitted to practice law, he made profession of his faith in 
Jesus the Christ, and was baptized by Dr. W. S. Belding, 
in Lock Haven, Pa. Being strongly impressed with the 
idea that his talents should be improved by preaching the 
glorious gospel of God, he abandoned the profession of 
law, and commenced to preach in Atlanta, Illinois. From 
Atlanta he went to Forest, in Livingston County, 111., 
and preached for a time ; thence to Beaver Creek, Wash- 
ington County, Md. Here he preached and taught pub- 
licly, and from house to house, for three years. His 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. 265 

health declined so that he was obliged to desist from pub- 
lic speaking. He returned to Howard, Pa., in April, 
1874, and died on the 21st of the following June, leav- 
ing an amiable and devoted sister-wife and four lovely 
children — two daughters and two sons — with numerous 
and steadfast friends to mourn his early death. 



23 



266 JOEU PACKER MITCHELL. 



ADDEESS. 

[^Delivered September 9th, 1871, at a Sunday-school picnic, at Beaver OreeJc, ifcfcZ.] 



When this grove is ringing with the songs we sing 
here to-day, are our hearts as busy in the sentiments as 
our voices with the music? or are we only seeking in 
these grand old woods to rival the feathered songsters, 
whose notes all summer long have filled the leafy canopy 
with music and gladness? If this is our purpose we have 
entered upon a hopeless contest, for the voice of man is 
not tuned so sweetly as the voices of birds, and only by a 
great stretch of imagination can we say of any human 
singer, " he sings like a bird.'' 

And yet we must acknowledge that these creatures 
which God has made to pour forth sweet melody, and to 
gladden the earth with song, have the advantage of us in 
the sweetness of their harmony. How vast is our advan- 
tage over them if we answer the end of our being as truly 
as they answer the end of theirs ! If we sing to make a 
noise only, they can sing better than we ; but if we tune 
our voices to sing of God, and heaven, and eternal bliss ; 
and if our hearts are full of praise and thanksgiving to 
him who so wonderfully made us for so glorious an end, 
how much we soar in soul above the choristers whose do- 
main we have to-day invaded ! 

I have watched these birds from day to day, and I 
think I have learned a lesson from them which. I may re- 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 267 

peat with profit, not to the children here only, but all 
within sound of my voice. 

They came hither with the genial beams of early spring, 
and I heard their song and saw them fleet joyously in 
and out among these trees, apparently as happy and free 
from care as childhood on a holiday morning. But they 
were happy in the midst of toil ; for I heard the sturdy 
stroke of the woodpecker, as he perseveringiy labored from 
day to day carving out in the limbs of the gnarled oak 
a home for his prospective family; and the sweet notes of 
the robin, which made the morning air melodious, as it, 
full of gladness and ch^eer, began each morning a day 
of hard work: for the sticks, and mosses, and grassy 
linings of the robin's nest were h^avy loads to him, and 
with no little toil were they fixed into their plaoes. And 
60 all the feathered tribe which followed the retreating 
winter into these woods were busy with the work which 
God had given them to do ; and when the nests were fin- 
ished and had received the precious -eggs for which they 
had been made, and these gave place to young birds, and 
I heard their happy chirpings for food, and family cares 
were imposed upon the old birds, I heard no complaining 
notes ; but the food was sought and obtained, and the song 
went on, and all w^ere glad and joyous as though there 
was nothing for birds to do but sing and be glad, and let 
the world go on without a stroke of care. 

Parents and children, these birds have as heavy a task 
imposed upon them in their sphere of life as any we have 
in ours. The struggle for their preservation is as hard as 
that in which we are engaged for th<e preservation of 
ours. The sticks they carried in constructing their nests 
were as heavy timbers to them as those we carry and 
handle to repair our homes. The insects they slew and 
carried in triumph to their hungry brood, the grain they 



268 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

hunted in the blaze of a hot summer sun, the flights they 
had to escape the rapacious hawk, bring home to us 
thoughts of many a point of likeness between their lives 
and ours. Yet they have all the time set us an example 
of patience, perseverance, and contentment, and they have 
greeted our ears with sweetest song while they labored on 
in ceaseless toil. 

The same God who made them for their place in crea- 
tion made us for ours, and while God^s Son tells us that 
not a sparrow falls to the ground unnoticed by the Father, 
he adds, we are of more value than many sparrows. 
Why is it, then, that we, in our highest sphere, may not 
take up our toils of 6ach day with hearts as light and 
songs as glad as theirs ? Have we difficulties and dangers 
to harass us and try us? So have they; for I have heard 
the darkness resound with the dismal hoot of the owl 
which sought their lives, and I have seen the branch 
which held their precious family quiver in the storm. 
May they pursue the search for food with joyful anticipa- 
tions of the chirpings which will give place to tones of 
gladness when the hungry mouth is filled ! And may not 
we, while we toil at the plow, or at the work-bench, or in 
the store, or study to win the means of life to those dear 
to us, fill our hearts with happiness when we remember 
how gladly the fruits of our labor will be received by 
those for whom they were won? Or if we must travel 
abroad and leave the delights of home behind us, have we 
not got our reward when our wanderings lead us back to 
the spot dearest to us on earth, and we feel from the 
depths of our hearts that 

" 'Tis sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark, 
Bay deep-mouthed welcome as we draw near home ; 

'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark 
Our coming, and look brighter when we come? " 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 269 

All our earthly troubles have their corresponding joys, 
and all our earthly labors have their earthly reward. In 
these respects, I see not that we have advantage or disad- 
vantage of the humble creatures which God has made. 
He has given us wants as mere animals in common with 
all other creatures, and so He has placed within our reach 
the means of satisfying them. Why, then, are we not joy- 
ous, and happy, and full of song? Why are we often 
gloomy and sad, and brooding over our work, and com- 
plaining of our tasks, and feeling that our load is heavy 
to bear ? There is one great law which we have violated 
that our present teachers, the birds, have kept; and 
their keeping of it has filled them w^ith happiness and 
contentment, while our violation of it has filled our 
spirits with groaning and pain. They have fully ansivered 
the end for ichich God made them. They are just what he 
intended them to be, and to be this is to be always happy. 
They are not so made as in the least degree to understand 
the glorious plans of the Creator, and consequently they 
are so made that they naturally and instinctively carry 
out the WILL OF God. They work like machines, filling 
the place for which they were made ; and all the laws 
which govern their lives work unobstructedly and infalli- 
bly, for these laws were framed in an all-wise Mind. We 
have for our exalted privilege an understanding of the 
plans of God so far as it is necessary to work with him 
in carrying them out. We can not see the end of them, 
but we can receive intelligible directions from Him who 
can, if we follow these directions. The end for which we 
were made will be reached by us, and in reaching it we 
are made happy to the fullest capacity of our natures. 
And so the life of a man, who walks as God desires him 
to walk, is a life of continuous pleasure; and where we 
hear of one who does this, we hear of one who can not be 



270 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

plunged into gloomy melancholy by any event of life. 
Though the song of birds may cease when the seeker of 
prey has his wing between them and the sun, and though 
their hearts throb in fear when the hoot of the owl dis- 
turbs the stillness of the night, when the shadow is gone 
or the morning light is come the song is heard again^ and 
the bright plumage flits through the sunshine as though 
deadly dangers were unknown. So when men of God are 
rudely seized by cruel hands, and beaten with many 
stripes, and covered with wounds, and thrust into dark 
and lonesome inner prisons, their hearts may sink and their 
nerves may quiver while the heavy hands are upon them ; 
but in the very depths of the dungeon, with their feet in 
the stocks, and an unknown fate before them, a light reaches 
them which is not of this world. They remember the 
blessed Master who suffered for them, and it is a privilege 
to suffer for His sake, and they care not what men do to 
them, for the Spirit looks with unfaltering faith to the 
glorious home "over there,^' and the midnight silence is 
broken, and hymns of gladness fill the dismal prison ; for 
the smarting wounds and gloomy surroundings are re- 
membered no more, for the exceeding joy with which faith 
in a glorified Redeemer, and obedience to him have filled 
the hearts of his followers. 

"We have more to do if we accomplish the objects for 
which we were made than mere animals have, but we 
have more to do it with, and the end is incalculably 
more glorious. And, while w^e have listened when God 
speaks to us in his word, and so learned what he would 
have us do, we may bid defiance to time, and change 
and death, and hold to our hearts a happiness which wdll 
enable us always to rejoice, and fill our hearts with 
strong desire to praise God in song. Then have our 
songs a music and a richness which no harmony on earth 



SERMOXS AND ADDRESSES. 271 

can rival, and, while with the organs of speech we make 
the earth resound, our hearts reach out towards the eter- 
nal blessedness and delightful rest of our home in heaven, 
a building of God, a house not made with hands, eter- 
nal in the heavens. 

One more lesson from the birds, and we are done. Of 
late I have observed them gathering into flocks, and 
the songs they used to sing have changed for notes of a 
different character, and it is evident to any observer that 
they have something of importance in contemplation. 
We know from our observations in the past what it is 
they have in view. The cold winds which come sweep- 
ing down upon them touch the instincts of these little 
creatures with the impulse to flee away before the breath 
of coming winter is upon them, to the sunny land where 
blossoms are ever blooming and where the air is ever 
perfumed with the odor of flowers. In a little while we 
will have them no more with us. These trees, so beauti- 
ful and verdant, will now stretch their naked arms into 
a bleak, cold sky, and songs of gladness will not be 
heard here. But the same birds which have lent us 
their presence through the summer will be repeating 
their labors and singing their songs in a sunnier clime, 
and happiness is in store for them there as here, because 
they will follow out the laws of their nature then as they 
do now. 

There is a winter of life coming for us all. The 
hearts that beat high to-day will soon be stilled in death. 
The voices we hear in song will be silent forever. The 
places our presence now fill will know us no more. 
Are we preparing for that event so certain to come? 
Do we gather ourselves together and cheer each other 
on, and speak of the home where no winter nor night 
nor storm can ever come, and "where, amid the flowers 



272 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

that deepened to their eternal beauty before the trees of 
Eden bowed themselves to the breezes of earth," we may 
meet with all the good who have gone before, and dwell 
in perfect happiness for evermore? 

In midsummer there was a pair of birds that built 
a nest and reared their young within hand-reach of my 
door. The little ones grew rapidly, and when they were 
well feathered the nest could scarcely contain them, and 
the parents began operations to persuade them to fly. 
How fearful they were, and how careful, but how per- 
severing! That meant that every little fledgeling should 
learn the use of its wings. And I saw them for a little 
while about the trees, and then they all departed to- 
gether, and if I ever saw them again I could not dis- 
tinguish the young from the old birds. Their develop- 
ment had come, and they were what they had been made 
for. Now if these young birds had been left in the nest 
with their wings unused, and no experience furnished 
them in the realities of the life of birds, they might 
have had food carried them and lived in ease through 
the summer; but when the frosts were whitening the 
earth and smiting the leaves from the trees, and the cold 
wdnds were wailing the death-song of the dead summer, 
and other warblers were winging their flight to the 
sunny south, they must have been left to perish in our 
cheerless clime. 

Christian parents, let me say to you that your work 
for your children is but poorly done when you fill their 
mouths with food and cover them with fine clothing. 
If this is done for them and no more, would you do a 
less cruel thino^ to withhold all nourishment from them 
in feeble infancy, that they might in the morning go 
home to that clime where the sun will never set and 
where no winter of life will ever come? When death 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 273 

comes, all that you have done for them as pertaining 
merely to this present life will only make them feel the 
more intensely the blighting chill which will congeal their 
life forever. You must teach them to fly. God has 
given them capacities which may lay hold on undying 
life. The blessed Jesus in his sublime prayer to the 
Father says, "And this is life eternal that they might 
know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom 
thou hast sent.^' This knowledge must be imparted, and 
it is obtained at the unfailing fountain of eternal truth, 
in the blessed volume which God has given us in our 
own language, the Holy Scriptures. Can a Christian be 
indeed a Christian who labors only to give children lux- 
ury and ease here, and fails to give them knowledge of 
God and of Christ, that they may secure that "good 
part which can not be taken away?'^ The world has 
never seen an institution so well adapted to the teaching 
of the truths of the Bible to children as the Sunday- 
school, and it is not half what it might be, and what, 
by God's help, it will be when we all give ourselves to 
the work as we should. Let us make this day of re- 
joicing and good cheer an epoch in the history of 
our Sunday-school, and of the community in which we 
labor, and work in the coming year, as we have never 
worked before, to teach children the truth and lead them 
to God. 

Fathers and mothers, let us learn a lesson from the 
birds which have finished their summer's work about us, 
and are now ready to depart with their young, 

" To the land of the cedar and vine, 
Where tlie flowers ever blossom, the beams ever shine;" 

and where the capacities which have been developed 



274 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

here may exert themselves in new scenes of happiness 
and summer joy. 

The sunny head that nestles in your bosom now can 
not always rest there. The hand with which you push 
aside the thorns which beset your child's pathway will 
grow feeble, and, after awhile, death will clasp it, and 
your children's tears will fall upon the cold clay which 
has given up the tenant who once loved them as none 
but parents ever love. If you give your children all 
that earth can offer, you give them nothing which can 
serve them or you when they stand about your dying 
form and see the last of a parent's love as the light of 
earth fades from your eye in the dark night of death. 
Then your battles for them will be done and their own 
will be but begun. But give them what God offers, 
what heaven furnishes, what Jesus Christ has brought 
right in among us, and you tie a family circle together 
with a bond which death can not sever; and which will 
grow stronger and stronger throughout eternity, while 
you furnish your children an irresistible weapon for the 
battle of life. 

May God help us all in every work which he has 
given us to do, is my prayer. 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 275 



THE KEYS OF THE KINGDOM. 

" And I will give unto thee the keyvS of the kingdom of heaven : and 
whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven ; and 
whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." — Matt, 
xvi. 19. 

A PREACHER of the gospel of Jesus Christ is often at 
a loss to know what class of his hearers he is most 
under obligation to address. When he looks about him 
upon those who profess to be followers of the Son of 
God, and witnesses their coldness and want of activity 
in the service of God, and their carefulness and burning 
zeal in the pursuit of what this poor world offers, his 
duty seems to urge him to an effort to bring his brethren 
to a better realization of their glorious privileges in 
Christ, and of their danger of sowing to the flesh when 
they aught to be sowing to the Spirit. When we read the 
apostolic letters addressed to congregations of Christians 
or to individual disciples, we can not but be impressed 
with the great anxiety manifested by these writers for 
a continual growth in spirituality, and a continuous 
approach to the stature of perfect manhood in Christ 
Jesus. No one can carefully read tlie New Testament 
without the conclusion that salvation from sin and 
eternal life in Jesus Christ must be made the chief 
objects of those who are to enjoy these priceless gifts 
of God. And when we read that many will seek to 
enter in, and shall not be able (Luke xii. 24) ; that 
many will say, We have eaten and drunk in thy pres- 



276 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

ence, and hear only the stern and awful reply, "Depart 
from me, I never knew you,^' we tremble lest some of 
our brethren are deluding themselves with a hope that 
mere formal obedience will secure them an entrance into 
the eternal city, while their hearts are busy with the false 
and fleeting things of this life. And when w^e meet on 
the first day of the week to break bread, and so to com- 
memorate the fearful suffering and awful death of our 
beloved Master, and brethren can manifest coldness and 
unconcern by engaging in frivolous conversation, we can 
not but fear that we need such study and reflection and 
teaching as w^ill lift us up out of the things temporal, 
which are distracting our thoughts, to a contemplation 
of the things eternal, by which only w^e can hope for 
salvation. 

Again, it is not always those who put on the greatest 
appearance of devotion who are really the most devout 
and devoted; nor is it always those who accomplish 
most in the way of conforming their daily lives to the law 
of Christ who really stand highest in the sight of God. 
I can easily understand how a man may be so born and 
brought up, and surrounded by favorable circumstances 
all his life, that he scarcely has an idea of the frightful 
temptation to which his less highly favored brother is 
exposed. I can understand how that a man may have 
inherited an evil disposition ; have been surrounded all 
his life by bad influences, so that, w^hile he may accom- 
plish much less in the eyes of men, as a follower of the 
Saviour, he may really accomplish much more in the 
sight of God. Only the Searcher of hearts can really 
know how much or how little is being accomplished by 
any disciple, for he only can know the nature of the 
struggle which is going on to secure the victory. Were 
it not for this thought I would often give up in despair, 



SEBMONS AND ADDRESSES. 277 

and feel that our labor is in vain. If we think of our- 
selves as compared with the perfect standard furnished 
us in the New Testament, how vast and how numerous 
must be the changes to bring us up to it. But, brethren, 
while we may think of many reasons for not being up to 
that standard, and while our God may justify many who 
are right in purpose and who fail in practice, do any of 
you see a gleam of hope held out in the Holy Scriptures 
for those who profess to follow Christ, and who know- 
ingly, willingly and deliberately fall short of their duty, 
and expect, as long as they live, to continue the same 
life? I do not know of any gleam of hope for such. I 
have no hope for myself and no hope for any, unless we 
can honestly lift up our weak and sinful souls to God, 
saying: Lord, I have done what I could. I can do 
no more. Help me in my weakness, forgive my offenses, 
and cover my unrighteousness. A very weak man may 
hope for much when he has done what he could. A 
very strong man may fail entirely of the eternal inherit- 
ance when he has left undone what he might easily ac- 
complish. 

The painful consciousness of our ow^n unworthiness 
leads me often to study and often to preach the privi- 
leges and duties of those who have put on Christ; and, 
above all, I feel the situation most when I remember 
that if our practice in daily life was all it ought to be, 
"others seeing our good works" would be led to Jesus 
by the example of his followers. We are, in our 
families, in our business associations, in our social circles, 
in all the relations of our lives, continually before the 
searching eyes of those who remember our profession 
when we forget it, and who are ruinously affected by our 
aberrations from the strait and narrow path. Oh wife, 
with an unbelieving husband, there is a responsibility 



278 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

resting upon you which can not be overrated. You are 
tried by the ten thousand cares which only a wife and 
mother can ever know. Your heart's affections are 
reaching out with yearnings unspeakable to clasp your 
husband as your brother in Christ in an embrace which 
death can not break. Yet how sadly you remember that 
often his critical eye detects in you weaknesses which he 
makes the apology for his own neglect of duty. The 
sympathy of the blessed Jesus is with you in your strug- 
gle, and he only knows how to sympathize truly. Only 
remember, when your cares are most bitter, when your 
trials are strongest, when your whole nature is unstrung 
to call on him who is ever ready to help, and never for- 
gets that you may be an instrument, and an important 
one, in the salvation of him to whom through life you 
cling. Oh, Christian husbands, brothers, sisters! remem- 
ber always those dear to you by the closest of earthly 
ties, and live so that your influence may lead them to 
Christ. It is a dreadful thought that your unruly tem- 
per, or your bad habits, or your careless life may be the 
means of the damnation of those who are the dearest to 
you in life. 

But, brethren, while we are thus painfully aware of 
our own weaknesses and imperfections when we compare 
ourselves with the perfect standard, I nevertheless be- 
lieve that most of us are earnestly striving after higher 
perfection. I know, also, that we have many friends who 
meet here with us who are not making any kind of effort 
whatsoever ; and I remember how busy death is, and 
how sad a thing it is to bury our dead out of our sight, 
and turn away from the fresh mound of earth with hope- 
less hearts, and carry through life such memories of the 
lost one as we would gladly banish forever if we could. 
And oh, I remember the awful language of our Lord 



SEEMONS AND ADDRESSES. 279 

which shall smite with eternal anguish those who know 
his will and do it not — '^Depart from me, ye cursed, into 
everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels;" 
and all the ties which unite me to my fellow-men urge 
me to the eifort to say to them such words of Jesus and 
his commissioned teachers as Avill win them away from 
sin, to lay hold on the hope set before them. And you, 
my friends, who meet with us and witness our acts of 
worship, and hear our teaching and our prayers, do not 
imagine that when we address you we ignore the fact 
that we are in need of much teaching and of much 
higher perfection ourselves. We invite you to follow us 
only as we follow Christ; and to lead us when your own 
following of the Saviour shall carry you beyond us. 

If there had never been any teaching of things neces- 
sary to salvation, except those which are stated in terms 
in the Scriptures, it would be a simple and easy thing to 
point out to any man who wants to be sav^ed what he 
ought to do ; but the efforts which men have made to 
make the Christian religion a philosophical system, have 
resulted in greatly confusing the whole subject, and 
there may be those here to-day who are really in doubt 
as to what a man^s duty to God is, that tlie blood 
of Christ may cleanse him from all sin. I propose to 
folloW' out the w^ords of Jesus which constitutes my text, 
in connection with other words of his which relate to the 
same subject, until we find in their fulfillment the terms 
distinctly laid down upon which sinners are offered the 
forgiveness of sin through our Lord Jesus Christ. 

First, then, we affirm what we need not stop to 
prove — that the keys of the kingdom of heaven which 
were given to Peter were not literal keys of brass or 
iron or any other substance; and this is plain from the 
fact that the kingdom of heaven has not literal doors 



280 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

nor literal locks which may be opened by the use of 
literal keys. The language is certainly proved to be 
figurative by the fact that it will not bear a literal con- 
struction. The kingdom of heaven is represented by 
something inclosed and locked, but there is to be a pos- 
sibility of opening it by means of the keys given by the 
Son of God to Simon Peter; that is, authority is to be 
vested in Peter to open the kingdom of heaven so that 
men may enter in. It would be easy to show, from 
many passages of Scripture, that when the words key or 
keys are thus made use of, the idea is that he who holds 
them has authority conferred upon him over that to which 
the keys apply. But it would unnecessarily occupy time, 
for I take it you all agree with me that the word, as used 
in our text, implies that Peter is to have authority to 
open what is closed when the authority is given; and 
the language which follows is in exact harmony with 
this construction : " Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth 
shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt 
loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.'^ Here is a 
most tremendous power given to Peter, and if the im- 
pulsive, ardent man — who was rebuked most severely by 
his Master for declaring he shall not be put to death, 
having in his heart the things of men and not the things 
of God — is to wield this power according to his own 
unaided judgment, we may well tremble for the great 
work with which he is intrusted. But he who conferred 
this extraordinary power upon Peter, had full knowledge 
of all that was to follow, and had fully arranged every 
thing needful, so that Peter might act with as much cor- 
rectness as though he were God himself. But, in the 
Scripture now under consideration, we simply have the 
man Simon Peter, with all his imperfections and human 
weaknesses, set before us as the embassador of the Son 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 281 

of God, holding unlimited power to bind and loose on 
earth what shall forever be bound and loosed in heaven. 
AVhat Peter shall do under this authority will be as 
though Jesus Christ himself had done it. From his 
throne in heaven he will indorse all that Peter may do 
under this authority given him. If I have business to 
be transacted in California, and a friend of mine is 
going to that State to whom I wish to intrust my 
affairs, I give him a letter of attorney, empowering him, 
according to his discretion, to act for me as fully as 
though he was myself. Just such authority it is which 
Jesus gives to Peter in the words before us. 

I pause here to call particular attention to this fact: 
This Jesus is the Son of God; he is the only Saviour 
of sinners : " There is no other name given under heaven 
among men whereby we must be saved. '^ He has a 
work yet to do on earth — a fearful struggle against the 
powers of evil — and then he goes back to the glory he had 
before the world was. When he has suffered and entered 
into his glory men w^ill not be able to look upon his 
shining brightness, or to hear his blessed voice. But now 
he has given Peter, a man — and a weak man at that — 
power to speak for him, and has promised to indorse in 
heaven what his embassador on earth shall do. Oh ! 
friends, if you have been striving, praying and longing 
to hear the voice of the exalted Jesus speak peace to 
your troubled souls ; if you have often doubted whether 
you heard it or not; if you have no positive evidence 
that you have heard it, I ask you why you have not 
concentrated all your attention on this man who holds 
the keys, who is authorized to bind and loose, until 
you have seen him use his authority, and heard him 
pronounce the commandments which are as though 
uttered by the Lord Jesus himself? Jesus has done 
24 



282 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

for you just what needed to be done; so that you may 
hear one of your own race tell you, as he told Cor- 
nelius, ^^ words whereby thou and thy house shall be 
saved/' Can any thing more simple and easy to be 
understood be devised than is devised by the Saviour, 
that men may learn the way of eternal life? Xow, let 
us have no plunging into the mysteries which surround 
this whole subject of redemption; but, leaving them to 
God, let us take the most natural way to find out what 
we must do to be saved and become citizens of the 
kingdom of heaven — heirs of eternal life. Let us, for 
the time being, forget all else, and only keep strictly 
before us the fact that Peter has the keys, and watch 
carefully until we see him use them. 

But lest some one be troubled with the fear that Peter, 
who so unseasonably drew his sword; who so cruelly 
denied his suffering Master; who forgot his commission 
and led a fishing party to the sea, may, after all, fail 
in the work, we shall trace up another agency, who is 
as mighty as God; who is indeed the Spirit of God; but 
who, nevertheless, as we shall see, acts always in perfect 
harmony with the fact that the power to bind and loose 
is conferred on the humble fisherman. 

We call you away from the scenes and words at the 
coast of Csesarea Philippi, only asking you to carefully 
bear in mind the language of Jesus to Peter, to which 
attention has been called; and we transfer ourselves to 
an upper room in the city of Jerusalem, where this same 
Jesus, with the same group which was with him before, 
is engaged in keeping the last feast of the passover. 
The Apostle John has given us, at considerable length, 
the conversation which the Saviour at this time held 
with his disciples; but it is to a particular subject re- 
ferred to that I call attention. In the sixteenth and 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 283 

seventeenth verses of John xiv. — ^' And I %cill pray the 
Father, and he will give you another Comforteo^^ that he 
may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of truth; 
ichom the world can not receive, because it seeth him oiot, 
neither knoiveth him: but ye know him; because he dwelleth 
with you, and shall be in you.'' Again in the twenty-fifth 
and twenty-sixth verses of the same chapter, he says : — 
*^ These things have I spoken unto you, while being yet 
'present with you. Bid the Comforter, which is the Holy 
Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall 
teach you all things, and bring all things to your remem- 
brance, whatsoever I have said unto you." Again in chap- 
ter xvi., from the seventh verse to the fifteenth he says — 
'^ Nevertheless I tell you the truth; it is expedient for you 
that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will 
not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto 
you. And ivhen he is come, he will reprove the world of 
sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment : of sin, because 
they believe not on me ; of righteousness, because I go to my 
Father and ye see me no more ; of judgment, because the 
prince of this world is judged. I have yet many things to 
say unto you, but ye can not bear them now. Howbeit 
when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into 
all truth : for he shall not speak of himself ; but whatsoever 
he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you 
things to come.'' 

From this we might conclude that Christ has become 
discouraged with Peter, and that the great work of open- 
ing the kingdom of heaven is to be intrusted to no less 
person than the Spirit of God ; the same of whom it is 
written in the beginning of the Bible, "And the Spirit 
of God moved on the face of the waters/' Yes, Jesus, 
the uncreated God, is to go back to his native heaven, 
and the Spirit without flesh is to come to Christ's chosen 



284 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

ones and complete the work of human redemption. 
While Jesus was in his humiliation^ he took upon him- 
self all the limitations and weaknesses of humanity, and 
in this situation could never be an ever-present Saviour 
to all who obey him throughout the whole earth. But 
let us be careful what we are learning as we trace this 
subject, for much, delusion is in the world on account of 
a misunderstanding of what is taught in regard to the 
Holy Spirit. There is nothing connected with man^s 
nature so hard to gain a comprehension of as the human 
spirit. I form all my ideas of the spirit of a man by 
the revelations which it makes through his body. I 
have no way of gaining any direct knowledge of any 
spirit — divine, human or infernal — except as the spirit 
is clothed upon with some medium through which it 
may communicate with me. When I read of that mys- 
terious agency which moved upon the face of the waters 
when the earth was coming out of chaos, I gain the idea 
that there is the Spirit of God ; but I can gain no sense 
knowledge whatever of such a Spirit; and yet there is 
no revelation directly of this Spirit which presents him 
abstractly in any more tangible form. The best and 
only accurate knowledge we can gain of the person of 
the Father is in Jesus of Nazareth. He was God in 
flesh, and being in flesh, he came down to the compre- 
hension of men. The same is true of the Holy Spirit. 
There is no intimation in Scripture that there shall be 
a peculiar language by which the Spirit of God shall 
communicate with us through feeling or sensation ; or 
that some peculiar emotion shall be imparted to the 
sanctified by which they shall recognize the Holy 
Spirit. There is a test given by which we know the 
Spirit, but that test is as far as possible from being of 
the mystical or emotional kind. In John's first let- 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 285 

ter (iv. 1, 2), he says: "Beloved, believe not every 
si)irit, but try the spirits whether they are of God; 
because many false prophets are gone out into the 
M'orld. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God : every spirit 
that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is 
of God.'' 

To know Jesus Christ intimately, as he is set forth on 
the pages of the New Testament Scriptures, is to get the 
best possible conception of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit 
which tilled, animated and prompted him is the Spirit of 
God, sometimes called the Spirit of Christ. It is enough 
for us to deny that there is any such thing taught in the 
word of God, as that the Holy Spirit will speak to us, 
by signs, impressions, sensations or any other language 
which shall be mysterious and peculiar in its nature. 
Jesus says he shall speak, and tells us what shall form 
the substance of his speaking, to wit : the personality of 
Christ himself. Unless there occur something to teach 
us differently, we shall expect to hear this Comforter, 
when he comes, speak as Jesus said he should. I admit 
that the word speak may have a figurative meaning, but 
I am bound to understand it as used literally, unless 
there is some good reason why it can not be so under- 
stood. 

We now have two thoughts before us, and we want to 
keep them distinct and definite, even should there seem 
to be a discrepancy between them. These two thoughts 
are : First, Christ promised to give Peter the keys of 
the kingdom of Heaven, and, without limitation of any 
kind, told him that what he did under this authority 
should be regarded as binding in heaven ; Second, The 
same Jesus told his apostles, the same Peter being among 
them, that he must go aw^ay that he might send a Com- 
forter to abide with them forever, and that when he came, 



286 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

he should reprove the world of sin, of righteousness 
and of judgment. 

Immediately following this last promise, Jesus, with 
his disciples, passes over the brook Cedron, and enters 
upon that fearful scene of mysterious and awful agony 
in which he sweat drops of blood, and ^^ offered up sup- 
plications with strong crying and tears," which agony 
was interrupted by the breaking in of a mob upon his 
privacy to lead him away to crucifixion. We pass over 
the fearful tragedy, in which the sins of men hung the 
Son of God upon the cross and put him to a shameful | 

and inconceivably painful death. The three dark days 
and nights have rolled away. For more than a month 
a risen Saviour has comforted the hearts of his disciples, 
and now he leads them out that they may witness his 
glorious ascension into heaven ; but before he leaves 
them, he gives them, in general terms, a commandment 
to be obeyed by them when he shall have gone. This 
commandment is commonly called the Great Commission. 
Let us read it as recorded by three different inspired 
writers : Matthew xxviii. 19, 20 — " Go ye therefore, and 
teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, 
and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to 
observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, 
Jo, I am icith you alicay, even unto the end of the world. 
Amen.'' Mark xvi. 15, 16 — '^ And he said unto them. Go 
ye into all the icorld, and preach the gospel to every crea- 
ture. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but 
he that believeth not shall be damned.'' Luke xxiv. 46, 47 
— '^ And said unto them. Thus it is written, and thus it be- 
hooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third 
day: and that repentance and remission of sins should be 
preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jeru- 
salem." 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 287 

In all this there is not a word said about the 
extraordinary fact that the keys had been given to 
Peter; but since Jesus is he who uttered that prom- 
ise I shall carefully keep my eye upon him to whom 
the power of binding and loosing is promised, and 
see what will come of these seeming contrary prom- 
ises and commands. True, John records a conversation 
in which the Saviour says three times, "Feed my 
lambs,'' but I can not be certain that that has a refer- 
ence to the keys. 

Following on I find in the first chapter of Acts this 
same commission alluded to, and also the promise to 
which reference has been made, to send the Comforter 
or Holy Ghost. Acts i. 4, 5 — '^ And, being assembled to^ 
gether with them, commanded them that they shoidd not de- 
'part from Jerusalem, but ivait for the promise of the Father, 
which, saith he, ye have heard of me. For John truly bap- 
tized with water ; bid ye shall be baptized with the Holy 
Ghost not many days henceJ^ 

Let us now pause and sum up Avhat is before us : 
First, Peter has the promise of the keys and the power 
to bind and loose on earth what shall be bound and 
loosed in heaven ; Second, All the apostles are under 
a command not to preach less than four things — (a) They 
are to preach Christ so as to make disciples, that is 
faith ; (6) They are to preach repentance ; (c) They are 
to preach remission of sins; {d) They are to preach 
baptism — but baptism is to come after repentance and 
before remission of sins ; for " He that believeth and is 
baptized shall be saved'' is the promise. But, third, 
Neither Peter nor any other can preach any thing until 
endued with power from on high, for the command is 
to "tarry at Jerusalem." 

After the ascension of the Saviour, then we have these 



288 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

men waiting in the city of Jerusalem for the fulfillment 
of the promise which Christ had given them concerning 
•the Holy Spirit. 

Now, my dear friends, I know not how clear or how 
confused your ideas may be about conversion; about the 
new birth ; about regeneration ; about the atonement ; 
about the operation of the Holy Spirit; but I ask you 
all to admit that what these apostles, chosen by Jesus 
Christ, trained by him through three years of his minis- 
try on earth, now waiting to be qualified by him with 
power from on high, shall say sinners ought to do for 
the remission of sins — is the right thing for them to do. 
And if you are puzzled in your mind by the fact that 
the Holy Spirit is going to do a great work here, I ask 
you to remember, not only that Jesus had promised to 
send the Spirit of truth, but that he had also given 
Peter authority to open the kingdom of heaven. As 
certainly as Jesus is the Son of God these promises have 
both been fulfilled ; and, if it confuses you to think of 
the teaching of the Holy Spirit, keep your ears open 
to the words of Simon Peter, who was a man even as 
we are. 

Follow the record through Acts ii. to Acts x. to show 
the perfect harmony of the teaching. It is all fulfilled. 
Peter is the speaker. The Holy Spirit gives him utter- 
ance. Faith, repentance, baptism and remission of sins 
are preached. The doors are wide open — the world is 
invited to come. Peter laid down the law on earth, the 
Master indorsed it in heaven. Whosoever will obey 
the commandments may have forgiveness of sins and a 
sure hope of eternal life. Then follows the second part ji 
of the great commission : '^Teaching them to observe 
all things,^^ etc. A holy and faithful life in Christ 
Jesus, a triumphant death, and then an eternity of 



I 



I 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 289 

immortality. Oh, sinner ! will you not give up your love 
of sin for the love of Christ? Will you not believe 
with all your heart on the Son of God? Repent, and 
be baptized this day for the remission of sins, that you 
may enjoy the privileges of children of the Lord God 
Almighty. 



25 



290 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 



THE GOOD FIGHT OF FAITH. 

Discourse delivered in Forest, 111., September 26, 1869. 

"Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou 
art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many wit- 
nesses. I give thee charge in the sight of God, who quickeneth all 
things, and before Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed 
a good confession; that thou keep this commandment without spot, 
unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ." — 1 Tim. 
vi. 12-14. 

Infidelity is a moral disease, and is as much more 
dreadful than all physical disease as the ruin of the im- 
mortal soul is more dreadful than the death of the body. 
It is often said that a man is not responsible for what he 
does not believe, nor worthy of reward for what he does 
believe. But this statement, in its general sense, con- 
tradicts all our experience, for we well know that a man 
is held responsible by society for what he might have 
known and has failed to learn. For instance, we see 
two children, of about the same natural abilities, attend- 
ing the public school, and well knowing that their cir- 
cumstances will forbid their attending any other school, 
or acquiring any other than a common school education, 
both having the same books, the same teachers, and the 
same surroundings. One applies himself with diligence 
to learn the truths his books contain, and at the age of 
maturity he is a useful man to himself and to the com- 
munity in which he lives, and all because he believes 
the truth he has taken pains to learn. The other pre- 



SER^rONS AND ADDRESSES. 291 

fers to play upon the streets in the mornings and even- 
ings, instead of studying his lessons, and takes no inter- 
est in his books or the school. He may reason that one 
is not responsible for what he does not know, nor worthy 
of reward or esteem for what he learns. He grows up in 
ignorance, is compelled to live a life of drudgery, while 
he sees his school companion rise to affluence, happiness 
and respectability. Who would be held responsible for 
this failure, before the community, on the part of one of 
these young men? Who but the young man himself? 
The rule which applies in this case is the very same 
which applies when not only a life is to be influenced 
for good or evil by our conduct, but when a whole eter- 
nity of happiness or misery is staked upon the course 
we pursue, and the rule is this^ All are responsible for 
what they might have known and have neglected to 
learn. Thi^ principle, which is so easily recognized in 
the affairs of this life, seems to puzzle many when ap- 
plied to the life which is to come; but is it not as plain 
in the one case as in the other? All knowledge which 
is valuable is acquired by the belief of truth, and we 
learn to believe truth by studying what it is. This is 
true of all knowdedge, whether it be that which is neces- 
sary to enable us to perform the ordinary duties of life, 
or that which makes us wise unto salvation. That 
W'hich makes the Christian's faith more valuable than 
any other, is the tremendous importance of what he 
believes, and not that he exercises any other faculty in 
believing it. Wherever the gospel is preached, all are 
told what they may obtain by believing and obeying it; 
and if they disbelieve, because they will not examine the 
testimony, who is responsible but themselves? Infidelity 
becomes a moral disease by being encouraged, and soon 
builds itself into a power which may keep from th« 



292 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

darkened and perishing soul the word of God, which 
would give it light and life. In its generally received 
meaning, it includes a disbelief in the Bible, in Jesus 
Christ, and in God, which would give it light and life. 
But in one of its meanings, even the professed followers 
of the Lord may be infidels, whenever they are not faith- 
ful to him. Fidelity means faithfulness, and infidelity 
means unfaithfulness. Then whoever is not faithful to 
the Lord Jesus may be said to be an infidel, and the 
difference between such an one and one who rejects 
Christ and the word of God altogether, is in degree and 
not in kind. It is the same which is capable of drying 
up and destroying all spiritual life at the fountain, in a 
less malignant form ; and when a Christian is not willing 
to learn and do his whole duty to Christ, the hand of the 
destroyer is upon him. 

When any one is satisfied from the testimony offered 
to his mind that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, 
and resolves to cast all burden upon him, and trust in 
him for that eternal life we all long for with such inten- 
sity; what happiness, or rather joy, fills the heart! Oh! 
who can ever forget the hour when he came to Christ 
all vv^eary and heavy laden, and broken down with sin, 
and confiding fully in his wisdom, his love, and his 
power to redeem? How often do we look back upon 
that blissful moment, when we sat at the feet of Jesus 
and knew that our sins were all forgiven us, and that 
the adorable Son of God had accepted us as his brethren ! 
Had we ever known joy like this before? Could all 
earth have for a moment tempted us from the position 
we occupied? Our hearts all tell us no! Nothing ever 
entered the heart of man so gloriously blissful as the 
knowledge that he was pure before God, washed from 
sin in the precious blood of his own Son, and made an 



3 



SERMOXS AND ADDRESSES. 293 

heir of everlasting bliss, looking upon the fleeting tilings 
of time, and realizing how short and uncertain is the life 
which we now live in the flesh, and how certain the fact 
that we must die, — w^hat other joy can compare with that 
of feeling that we are ready to go, of knowing that "to 
live is Christ, but to die is gain!" All of us who have 
obeyed from the heart the form of doctrine delivered us, 
have felt this joy, we have realized in our own souls 
how blissful a thing it ^vas to know ourselves pure and 
sinless children of God, and brethren of the Lord Jesus 
Christ. Brethren and sisters, why did we feel supremely 
joyous in our first love ? Have you ever analyzed your 
own feelings and asked yourselves this question? There 
is a valuable lesson for us all in making such an analysis. 
If we were joyous then, and nothing could tempt us from 
the object of our first love, may we not learn by a close 
and careful examination how to be always joyful, and 
how ever to preserve our fidelity to Christ? What, then, 
is the philosophy of our joy — the joy which we experi- 
enced when first we knew ourselves adopted into the 
family of our blessed heavenly Father? Was it not the 
consciousness that we had done the will of God, and 
received the pardon of our sins, in accordance with his 
promise? Was it not that the same testimony that pro- 
duced in us that Jesus was God's Son, now gave us an 
assurance that he had saved us from our sins? I know 
the response of every heart will be just what mine is — 
that such was the cause of our joy and humble trust in 
the Saviour. Then the question comes up, Are we not 
just as much the children of God now as we were then? 
and may we not secure to ourselves the same joy from 
the same knowledge? If we stand before God as doers 
of his will, and knoAV from the same source that we are 
free from sin and ready for death, will our joy be any 



294 JOHN PACKER 3IITCHELL. 

less than it was then, or will we be any less desirons of 
doing the will of him who loved ns and gave himself for 
us? The reason we were happy then — or, rather, let me 
say joyous — ^^vas because we had active absorbing faith 
which controlled all our actions, and led us to devote all 
our energies of soul and body to the service of Christ. If 
any of us have felt less joy since, it is because our faith 
has not been sustained by the food God provided for it, 
and is less active than in the beginning. There is no 
good reason why the disciple of Christ should ever feel 
less joy or less devoted than in the first hour of his dis- 
cipleship, for he relies not upon some imagination or 
vague impression of he knows not what; he has no fears 
that his imagination may have cheated him; but determines 
his knowledge of forgiveness from a source which can not 
be mistaken. He has it from, the word of God, which 
never fails. Now if he use the word continually, he may 
continually enjoy the pleasure of knowing the will of 
God and doing it, and draw inexhaustible delight from 
this never-failing fountain, Avhile he secures an inheri- 
tance of eternal joy beyond the Jordan of death. 

I call attention here to something which may not have 
occurred to all my hearers in regard to fa,ith— rl mean the 
Christianas faith — faith in the. glorious facts which are 
presented to us in the history of Jesus Christ. While 
there is only one kind of faith or belief, it may be of dif-^ 
ferent degrees. We may have strong faith or weak faith, 
and it is to this I desire to call attention. 

The other day, when the news came to us of the burial 
of more than a hundred men in a coal mine in Pennsyl- 
vania, the testimony was of such a character that we be- 
lieved it, and our faith in this fact filled us with sympathy 
for the poor fellows who then met such a terrible fate, as 
they were toiling far from the light of day to bring up 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 295 

fuel for those who were on the surface. And our hearts 
were overrunning for the poor, sorrowing widows and lit- 
tle children who had lost their fathers and husbands in 
this fearful catastrophe. But the time has gone by, the 
event is past into history, and already we feel less keenly 
about the sufferers. In a few years the occurrence will 
almost have passed from our minds; if any casual allu- 
sion is made to it, we will remember it, and our old faith 
in the fact will be faith still. But will it be strong as it is 
now? Will it be capable of exciting in us the same feel- 
ings it does now? We know that it will not. The im- 
pression on us will grow fainter and fainter as time rolls 
on, until it Avill move us no more than if the sufferers had 
not suffered at all. We can never refuse to believe the 
fact, but it will cease to excite our sympathies as it ex- 
cites them now^ But w^hat a Christian believes is just as 
important to him at one time as another, and his faith 
always ought to be active and vital. But if he receives 
truth into his heart sufficient at one time to move him to 
action, unless he continue to receive it constantly from 
the ever-flowing fountain of divine truth, it will grow 
old and cease to excite in him the emotion it once did. 
The story of divine love and mercy, the manger of Beth- 
lehem, and the cross of Calvary wdll get to be an old 
story, and we will no longer have a realizing sense of the 
great facts revealed in the Scriptures. But if we keep the 
Scriptures constantly before us and ponder upon them, 
this story never grows old. We read it wdth new delight 
and new profit every time we turn to it, and the great 
fact of God's having dwelt on earth in the person of 
Jesus Christ, and that he now reigns in heaven in the 
same glorious person, wdll become a part of our every- 
day life, and weave itself into all our thoughts, so that we 
will think of Jesus continually, and strive to copy the 



296 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

example he furnished us while he dwelt on earth. Turn 
to the admonition of the Apostle Paul in the Corinthians: 
" Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith '^ (2 Cor. 
xiii. 5), and let us see whether our faith is what it ought 
to be. Compare our own with the faith of those v/ho 
lived, and suffered, and died in the kingdom of our Lord — 
of the Lord Jesus Christ when it was first established — 
and let us see if we do not need continually to build up 
our faith by a study of the Scriptures upon which it is 
predicated. We ought so firmly to believe the truths of 
Christianity that they would be as much a part of our- 
selves as any thing which occurs to us now. This the 
primitive Christians did; they gave up all for Christ — 
fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, friends, neighbors — even 
life itself they parted with gladly when the service of the 
Redeemer required it. Would we do so much now? Let 
us ask ourselves a question : If it were announced in this 
village that General Grant would speak to a mass meeting 
in Fairbury to-morrow, how many Christians in this town 
would leave their work and hasten away to see the re- 
nowned man who commanded the Federal armies in the 
late great war? Oh, what a crowd would assemble to see 
the hero of Vicksburg, the Wilderness, and Appomattox ! 
and how numerous would be the followers of Jesus in that 
crowd ! What incites the people to this ? Why do they 
pour out to see a man they honor and esteem ? It is be- 
cause they have a realization of his being, and of his serv- 
ices performed. Their faith in his being and deeds is a 
living faith, and it shows its power in works. Do these 
same Christians, who thus turn out to see and hear a hero 
whose fame is merely of this earth, have the same realiz- 
ing faith in the truths of Christianity, in the ever-living 
Word of God ? Then when it is written, " For where 
two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I 



1, 



SEBMONS AND ADDRESSES. 297 

in the midst of them," do they understand that these 
words are as true as God himself, and that they have an 
opportunity of being in the presence of Jesus Christ him- 
self — the one who was God and became man, whose ex- 
istence was from eternity, and who liveth forever? Do 
they realize that they may come to the place where he 
meets with his disciples, and be blessed by the presence, 
not of earth's hero, but the all-conquering One who tri- 
umphed over death and hell, who entered heaven, not as a 
president or king over the things of this world only, but 
as sovereign of the universe ? How do their works an- 
swer for them ? ^' For faith without works is dead ; " and 
we always know just what any one's faith is by the works 
he does before our eyes. Do people rush to the place 
where Jesus himself said he would be? Do they hail 
with joy the coming of the hour when two or three may 
meet together with Christ in the midst? Brethren and 
sisters, how do your own hearts answer? It is needless 
for me to answer the question. The heart of every one 
here is best capable of answering it to the satisfaction of 
each one of you. If all Christians made the Scriptures 
their only study ; if they pondered the sweet and sublime 
and wonderful story of redemption ; if they sat at the feet 
of Jesus, and listened to his words as full of heavenly wis- 
dom, yet so overflowing with the tenderness and love 
which brought him to save a lost and ruined world, would 
any of us prefer scenes of excitement, or the sight of the 
great of earth, to the presence of the Saviour and the 
music of his words? What can any of earth's heroes do 
for us ? What can they all do for us ? If the president of 
the United States would bestow upon us all the favors he 
can lawfully give, if he appointed us to a grand office, and 
lavished favors and friendship upon us, what does it all 
amount to? He can do nothing to help us in that which 



298 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

is our great difficulty. His gifts must perish ! His friend- 
ship must cease with his life or ours, and all that he has 
done leaves us to go down to the gloomy, cheerless grave, 
to corruption and the worm, and all is to us as though we 
had never held a great man by the hand. But oh, I want 
the friendship of Jesus ! I want to be often in his presence ! 
I want to have the gifts he bestows upon his friends ! I 
want his love, and bless his adorable name. He loved me so 
dearly as to die for me while I was yet a sinner; and will 
he not love me if I come to Him weekly, daily, hourly, 
confessing my weakness and pleading for strength ? And I 
want to read about his life and his great work. I want to 
be familiar with his words, and treasure them in my 
heart of hearts, for they are " spirit, and they are LIFE.^' 
Oh, do we not all want to love Him, and to be assured 
that he loves us, and then, though the iron embraces of 
the tomb must seize upon our flesh, our spirits will go to 
the warm and loving arms of heaven though the worm 
feed upon our bodies. " If the Spirit of Him that raised 
up Jesus dwell in us,'^ we shall be also raised from the 
dust of earth to walk the golden streets of the New Je- 
rusalem ! "What hero of earth can compare with Jesus 
Christ our Lord ? What can we learn of equal value to 
us Avith those things which make us wise unto salvation? 
The great absorbing difficulty among Christians of our 
day, is their failure to study the Scriptures. Show me a 
Christian who makes the Scriptures his study, and who is 
ready to give to every one that asketh a reason of the 
hope that is in him, and I will show you one whose faith 
in the promises of the gospel is part of his life, and who 
realizes the truths of the gospel as he does the events 
which are every day occurring around him. 

The word of God is indeed '^ the sword of the Spirit," 
and no Christian can properly succeed in the good fight 



n 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 299 

of faith without this weapon. The life which we must 
live if we "walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit/' 
must be maintained by such food and exercise as has been 
ordained of God for spiritual growth. As we, when dead 
in sins, were quickened into life by the power of the 
truth, which entered our hearts by the word of God, so 
we must feed and sustain the life thus begun by drawing 
continual supplies from the unfailing fountain. And as 
physical exercise is necessary for animal life as well as 
food, so for spiritual life we must have exercise also. 
This we obtain by practicing what we learn in studying 
the Scriptures, and thus the written word of God becomes 
to us on earth w^hat the Divine Word, which was made 
flesh, is to us in heaven. The Apostle Peter says (2 Pet. 
i. 2), " Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through 
the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord." It is 
through knowledge, favor (grace) and peace are multi- 
plied — a knowledge of God and our Saviour. Are we not 
bound to obtain all the knowledge we can concerning 
them? and can we gain any now except through the in- 
spired word ? Oh ! then if we are responsible for all we 
might know and fail to learn, let us be diligent while it 
is called to-day, for the night of death is rapidly hastening 
on when no man can work. 

AYe are counseled by the apostle in the Scripture before 
us to fight the good fight of faith ; and would learn from 
this, if we were not taught anywhere else, that the Chris- 
tian life is a warfare. AYe can not stand still, we can not 
rest, we must be ever active in the service, and look 
for the long, long rest we shall enter into beyond 
this world of temptation and sin, weariness and sorrow. 
As soon as we are adopted into the Divine family, it be- 
comes necessary for us to increase our spiritual strength 
continually, and to grow in grace and in the knowledge 



300 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

of the Lord Jesus Christ, if we would not retrograde, for 
we must go one way or the other. Our faith in Jesus 
Christ will lift us up to heaven, or else the enemy will 
drag us down to the abyss. I sometimes hear preachers 
of the gospel urging young persons to become members 
of the Divine family, and telling them they will forfeit no 
pleasures by such a step, and I have known niisunder- 
standings to arise on this account. The truth is, no one is 
fit to be a member of the family of God who takes pleas- 
ure in sin and unrighteousness. If the gospel of Jesus 
Christ has not broken up the great depth of his heart, 
so that sin which hung Jesus on the cross is altogether 
hateful to him; so that his own sins are a burden from 
which he longs to escape, and the weight of which 
crushes him down at the feet of him who alone can wash 
them away in his own blood, he is not ready for adop- 
tion into God's family; and to go 'through the forms, 
when the heart is not right, is worse than useless, being a 
mere mockery of God. But oh! when one realizes his 
own weakness and nothingness ; when the galling bondage 
of sin, with its fearful wages of death, are crushing the 
heart, and when Jesus appears in all his loveliness, 
mercy, and power to redeem and save, then we may say 
that while all sinful pleasures must be left behind, there 
is a pleasure in the service of the Lord Jesus Christ 
which nothing earthly can equal. Instead of making 
your pleasures less, they are multiplied a thousand-fold, 
and no trouble or care of life, no fear of the monster 
whose shadow follows you from the cradle to the grave, 
can for one moment mar your peace or dampen your 
courage in the glorious warfare, while as faithful soldiers 
you " fight the good fight of faith.'' 

Infidelity, as we have already said, is a moral disease, 
and its approaches are insidious and dangerous; for while 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 301 

we may continue to have a form of godliness without the 
spirit, this fearful disease may be sapping our faith and 
its foundations, and utterly destroying all our spiritual 
happiness. Now, is there any way by which we may de- 
tect its approaches and apply the remedy in its very in- 
ception? Whenever Christians cease to feel as close to 
Christ as when their sins were first washed away; when- 
ever it is no longer pleasant for them to assemble where 
Christ is; whenever it is an irksome task for them to 
read and think" about the life, and death, and glorification 
of our Lord Jesus Christ, an insidious enemy is in the 
heart. There is no question of this, and no question 
about the danger. Have we not all seen how that pro- 
fessed Christians grow cold until whole congregations are 
in such a condition that they need and call for what is 
popularly called "a revival?^' Some eloquent and power- 
ful preacher of the word is secured, and by two or three 
weeks' preaching he re-awakens the old love of the disci- 
ples for their Master; the man Christ Jesus seems as near 
as ever; he realizes the truth of the gospel; he returns to 
his seat in his Master's presence, and for awhile all goes 
well again. Does any one believe that the Christian life 
was intended by its author to be enjoyed by fits and starts? 
Are we to be sometimes low down in the valley of gloom, and 
then exalted on the mountains of hope ? or was the life of the 
Christian intended to be a steady, onward, and ever-flowing 
stream, until it flowed itself out into an eternity of im- 
mortality? This coldness and falling away is a symptom 
of the dread disease we have mentioned. It is the result 
of infidelity to Christ, and may forever be prevented if 
we follow the injunction of the apostle — "To fight the 
good fight of faith.'' I do no not want to be understood 
as saying it is wrong to secure the services of some one 
mighty in the Scriptures to get up "a revival," but it is 



302 JOHN PACKER J^HTCHELL. 

utterly wrong that we should ever allow the necessity for 
such a thing to exist. We have the weapons at hand to 
" fight the good fight of faith '^ ourselves, and if we wield 
them with energy, any one of us is abundantly able, as- 
sisted only by our heavenly Father, to conduct the cam- 
paign successfully, and lay ofi* our armor, at the end of the 
war, with full assurance of eternal life. If the truths of 
Christianity seem less real to us than of events of daily 
occurrence, let us study them until they become reality. 
If the study of God's word is irksome to us, let us study 
it till it becomes agreeable to us. If our own hearts con- 
demn us, let us regulate our lives till they approve us; let 
us keep ever bright and living before us the grand truth 
we confessed when we died to sin and were made alive to 
God. As Jesus, our blessed Master, in witnessing the 
same confession — to w^it : that he is the Son of God — died 
in attestation of its truth, so let us ever remember that 
when we made this glorious confession before men, and 
were buried with Christ in baptism, we died to sin and 
were quickened to righteousness. If we keep Jesus be- 
fore us always as our example ; if Christ lives in our 
hearts by faith, no insidious infidelity can ever creep " 
upon us, no doubt can fill our souls with gloom ; but lay- 
ing hold on eternal life, whereunto we are called, we 
will "fight the good fight of faith" successfully, and 
achieve our greatest victory in the "dark valley of the 
shadow of death.'^ 

But faith is not a mere assent to the truth of Christi- 
anity, a compromise by which, we agree not to question 
any of the wonderful things which were said and done by 
Christ and the apostles. It must be a realization of the 
truth of these things, and a realization so strong as to be 
a part of our very lives. It must mold our actions and 
all our thoughts, and the result will be works in demon- 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 303 

stratlon of our faith, worthy of the glorious knowledge 
we have obtained of God and of Jesus our Lord. Like 
soldiers in the immediate vicinity of the enemy, we must 
sleep upon our weapons and have them ever at hand, for 
we are surrounded by foes on every hand, watchful and 
waiting for an opportunity to lead us chained captives 
into the heart of their camp. The Apostle Paul, in this 
letter to Timothy, speaks only of the fight, as addressing 
one who well knew the character of the enemy and the 
w^eapons to be employed. And doubtless Timothy well 
understood what Paul referred to, for we have it declared 
in another place, "• That from a child he had known the 
Holy Scriptures" (2 Tim. iii. 15). But when Paul ad- 
dressed the Ephesians, who had not this acquaintance 
with the Scriptures, he enumerated to them more particu- 
larly the forces of the enemy, the armor to be clad in, 
and the weapons, offensive and defensive, of this warfare. 
Let us, my brethren, never forget that we are on the 
trail of the foe, that we must be ever on our guard against 
an enemy unseen, invisible, but powerful to destroy all 
who are not clad in the armor of God, and ready to wield 
the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. (See 
Ephesians vi. 10-17). Let us imitate our beloved Master, 
w^ho, in his conflict with Satan in the wilderness, wielded 
the flashing blade against the wily foe with such eifect as 
to put him to shameful and ignominious rout. That we 
may all successfully fight the good fight of faith, lay hold 
on eternal life, and be ready for the appearing of our Lord 
Jesus Christ in power and great glory, is my constant 
prayer, for the Redeemer's sake. Amen. 



304 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



THINGS TEMPOKAL AND THINGS ETEENAL. 

" For our light affliction, which is hut for a moment, worJceth for its a far more 
exceeding and eternal weight of glory; while we look not at the things which are 
seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are tem- 
poral; hut the things which are not seen are eternal" — 2 Cor. iv. 17, 18. 

If we estimate a little babe — of what it is now capa- 
ble of — we will reach, the conclusion that no creature 
which has the breath of life is of less importance. 
Helpless in the use of not only those higher faculties 
which are peculiar to human beings, but also, in a 
great measure, in the use of those which are merely 
animal, it is entirely dependent for its existence upon 
those delicate' attentions which only a woman's love 
prompts, and which alone a mother's care can fully sup- 
ply. Imagine a scientist, capable of appreciating only 
that which can be turned to immediate use, analyzing 
a new-born babe, and telling its parents its value by a 
scientific and utilitarian standard. When he is done, 
he might add to the value he puts upon it all the 
treasures of the world, and the mother would tell him 
it is worth ten thousand times more than all. But sup- 
pose this man sadly and sorrowfully informs the parents 
that their little one will grow in physical stature and 
power, but that it will not grow in intellect — that it 
will get the body of a man and keep the mind of a 
babe; in other words, that it will be an idiot — how 
gladly would they see it sleep in death, and lay its 
little form in the grave! The mother who clasps tho; 



SEEMONS AND ADDRESSES. 305 

little helpless babe to her bosom looks down the vista 
of years to come, and the toils, cares and trials — the 
sleepless nights and days of weary watching — the anx- 
ieties and hopes and fears that little one will cost her, 
are all forgotten in the bright visions of the future. 

When, her work nobly done, his firm tread on life's track 
Will come as an organ-note, lofty and clear, 
To lift up her hopes, and her spirit to cheer. 

How many strong men are supporting the feeble steps 
of parents down the hill which slopes to the grave, and 
looking onward to the time when their own feebleness 
will be helped by the little useless dimpled hands which 
the baby examines as though they were some foreign 
curiosity ! 

We measure the babe by what it may be in this life, 
and, Avhen we would study its value, we do not think 
of it as it is now, or what it will be on any particular 
day of its w^hole career, but we think of the entire life 
at once; the present and the future are all as one 
before us, and our estimate is formed upon this basis. 
The father who toils from day to day, hardening his 
hands and whitening his hair and bowing down his 
form that those whom God has made dependent upon 
him may lack for nothing, does it all with a cheerful 
heart, and even loves more tenderly those who lay 
upon him the heaviest cares — and all this is because 
the whole of a human life spreads out before him when- 
ever he thinks of the value of any one of his children. 
How greatly is the present, with every one of us, filled 
up with the future ! How little joy and how little sor- 
row would any day of our lives give us, if we were so 
made that the imagination could not be filled with the 
future! I see a man toiling beyond his strength, rising 
26 



306 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

from sleep when all nature seems to invite him to repose, 
and retiring at night long after less busy creatures are 
asleep. I ask him why he taxes his life each day with so 
heavy a burden. I ask him if he will not have enough 
food and enough clothing and enough of the proper 
comforts of life if he spares his brain and nerves and 
soul an hour or two each day. ^^O! yes/' says he; "I 
will have food and raiment, but I am raising a family, 
and I want to give each of my children a start in life, 
and must educate them; and I will get old and helpless 
after awhile, and I must work as much as I can, and as 
long as I can, to provide for these contingencies.^' There 
it is; it is all for the future, and very little for the 
present ; and but for that picture which the imagination 
gives him of the days and years to come, the labor he 
performs daily would wreck him any day he lives. Now, 
dear friends, I have sought to reflect upon these common 
things which give us evidence of how much all our 
estimates of every thing depends upon the future, because 
I want you to enlarge the bounds of that future until 
eternity opens before you; and I want to ask you to 
begin to act this day upon the idea that forever and 
forever your begun existence will go on through the 
boundless cycles of eternity. With that view of human 
existence, which reaches from the cradle to the grave, 
we are all familiar enough, and many of us entirely too 
familiar. We make it our alL We form our plans for 
our children as though the field in which they are to 
act commenced in our arms and ended in the arms of 
death. We fill our lives with cares and joys and sorrows 
which have no higher note than the top of worldly am- 
bition, and no lower one than the bottom of the grave. 
But with no greater scope than this, we manage to get 
quite a pleasant and agreeable present, notwithstanding 



SERMONS AND ADDBESSES. 307 

all the earthly troubles which beset us, by constantly 
viewing the present upon a background of the future. 
There is hardly one of us who would not faint and fall 
by the way under the toils and cares of daily life, if we 
were not constantly lifted above them on the wings of 
hope. It is never exactly what we at any particular 
moment have in possession which makes our present 
life agreeable and endurable, but always that which we 
expect to reach. 

Now, if a future, which we know must in a little while 
find a dark ending at the grave, can so greatly affect our 
present life so that our to-day borrows nearly all its light 
from the yet unrisen sun of to-morrow, how think you it 
will be if we look steadily into a future which shall go 
on forever all illuminated with the deathless rays of the 
risen Sun of Righteousness ? If we can only get a reali- 
zation of this eternal future as we can of that future 
which is to be all shattered to pieces in death, do you 
not think it will give us wings to soar above the bit- 
terest cares of the present, and enable us to look from 
an infinite height calmly upon life's darkest disappoint- 
ments? And why may we not have such a realization? 
Why shall our to-morrow be bounded by the shadow of 
death? Are not the clouds which hang over the end 
of earthly existence all turned into gorgeous colors by 
the Sun of E-ighteousness who passed through them, even 
as the mists which hang over the awful gulf of Niagara 
are changed into bows of beauty by the rays of the sun? 
Has Jesus burst the bars of death and rode triumphantly 
through the demolished prison-house and left no breach 
through which, our eyes may gaze upon the endless glories 
of eternity? , 

Do you reply to me. All that is mere matter of faith 
in our present life is matter of sense? Have you for- 



308 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

gotten that you just admitted with me that our '^present" 
borrows nearly all its light from the future? And how 
does the narrow future of earthly life reach you but 
through faith? How did you learn that humanity sweeps 
around and finds a future ? Have you been into the 
future and returned, that you know what is coming by 
the exercise of sense? I imagine that if you had no 
power to believe truth upon testimony, you would have 
no power to grasp the idea of a future at all. You have 
no doubt — and no civilized man who has had an oppor- 
tunity to examine the subject has any doubt — that eight- 
een hundred years ago there lived in the world a most 
remarkable man, named Jesus of Nazareth. All admit 
that he was most perfect, and wonderfully remarkable 
just in those things which were farthest from what 
human ambition would aim at, or human selfishness 
aspire to. He was, by the account of his very enemies, 
influenced in all his recorded actions by no motive less 
than perfectly unselfish and disinterested love. He wore 
himself out for others. He made weary journeys; he 
endured privations ; he suffered hunger : he had his 
heart lacerated with grief, and his sensibilities disgusted 
with the most loathsome and hideous diseases of those 
whom he served; and they were, by his own choice, the 
poor and lowly and outcasts of earth. Strangely true, 
and true by his own deliberate purpose, was the mocking 
remarks of his foes when they stoned him before the 
cross — "He saved others, himself he can not save.'' 
Stronger testimony could not be offered than that he was 
clothed upon by the power of God, and wielded it with- 
out a touch of human selfishness. With greater wisdom 
than all the wise ones of earth; with power which en- 
abled him to cure incurable diseases with a touch, and 
to call death's victim from his arms with a word^ he was 



SEEMONS AND ADDRESSES. 309 

seized by wicked men and hung up naked on a cross until 
he died. Why did he die? Why did he save others, and 
refuse to save himself? Can you see any reason why such 
an one should die as he did, aside from the fact that hu- 
man beings have before them an eternal future? If he 
looked down from the heights of infinite glory, and saw 
humanity sinning and sorrowing and dying, then to be 
blotted out forever, and to be as though they never had 
been, do you suppose he would have taken upon him- 
self the awful burden which crushed his heart at Geth- 
semane and pierced his body at Golgotha? If each in- 
dividual of the human race had to endure the ordinary 
ills of human life, do you suppose that our preservation 
from these would have been worthy the unimaginably 
awful sacrifice of the only-begotten Son of God? Why, 
I hav^e beared many a sinner say, 'i This life is good 
enough for me, if I could only stay here;" and yet if 
we have not an eternal future before us, no sinner will 
have any more sorrow to endure than that of the pres- 
ent life ; for, when that is done, it is all over forever. 
The idea of annihilation is forever forbidden by the 
knowledge that Christ thought our salvation worthy the 
sacrifice of himself: ^'If Christ died for all, then were 
all dead." Christ^s shed blood gives us glorious hope 
of an eternal life, if w^e will wash and be healed; but 
it furnishes irresistible evidence that damnation is eter- 
nal also if we look with unfeeling hearts and tearless 
eyes upon those bleeding wounds, and say, by refusal 
to be his, "Jesus of Nazareth died for love of me, but 
I will not live for love of him." When he looked 
down from heaven upon the woes of earth, his vision 
saw all eternity groaning and hideous with the woes of 
earth's lost ones — one sinful life swept on in its misery 
till the night of death, to be borne onward despairingly, 



310 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

and wailing in the blackness of darkness forever! It 
was the issues of eternity which he saw, and they 
brought him down to his lowly life on earth. And all 
his preaching had eternity for its key-note. In all his 
conversations with his chosen disciples he sought to lift 
them up that they might see how narrow and little 
earthly life was, and how boundless and glorious a 
future they were for : " Take no thought/^ etc. Eternity 
was always before him ; and when he was led out in 
company with the man who carried the cross to which 
he was to be nailed, his thoughts were not of the shame 
he w^as to suffer, nor of the nails crushing through his 
hands and feet ; but, turning to the wailing women who 
followed him, he shows how perfectly the present was 
lost in the future, w^hen he exclaims, "Weep not for 
me, O, daughters of Jerusalem ; " and, at last, when all 
the tortures that human ingenuity could invent and in- 
flict, and more than human flesh could bear, was heaped 
upon him, with the grand vision of eternity before him, 
even in that dark hour of mortal agony, "he sees the 
travail of his soul and is satisfied ; " and, looking in 
the scowling faces of his murderous foes, he prays : 
" Father, forgive them ; they know not what they do.'' 
How beautiful to reflect that the dying Jesus saw just 
fifty days in the future three thousand of his foe's 
hearts broken for love of him, and, through faith in 
his name, made children of God and heirs of eternal 
life. Oh, how wondeVfully all things center in Jesus ^ 
Christ, and how gloriously and royally he bears them 
all. Every time we think of him, we have deepened 
in us the mighty meaning of the phrase, " In him all 
things subsist." I can preach no gospel, I can offer 
no hopes, I can raise no worthy thoughts, but behold 
the man Christ Jesus in the center of them all. I have 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 311 

sought to lead your minds, dear friends, to some sort 
of measure of your own existence, and, after all, the 
strongest ideas I can grasp are all borne in the soul- 
subduing and soul-cheering sentence, "Christ died for 
you." If he died for us, it must be true that we are 
born for eternity, and that there is no real future ex- 
cept that in which the grave is a mere gate opening into 
a realm which the eye of God only can measure. 

What we want to succeed then in doing, if we would 
measure ourselves aright, is to raise in our own minds 
some conception of whatever was and is in the mind of 
Jesus. Suppose that on 'some summer day you have ar- 
ranged to have^ a pleasure excursion, taking your wife 
and children with you to share in your joy ; rising early 
in the morning, all preparations are made for going, 
when suddenly the dust is flying before a gale and the 
heavens are black with a coming storm. The little ones, 
who have a feeble realization of the future, are full of 
grief and disappointment, and they begin to wail and 
weep the loss of their anticipated pleasure ; but, though 
the sky is overcast and the rain falling and all gloomy 
around you, you quiet them, and their faces brighten 
when you say, "It wont last long, its only a showier; 
when it has passed away the air w^ll be so cool and 
pleasant, and, with no dust upon the road, our drive will 
be more delightful after the storm." Oh! my friends, can 
we read the dark face of the sky and make a dark 
present brighten by so short a sweep into the future ? 
and shall we suffer earth^s cares to crush us when faith 
in the Son of God opens a whole eternity which wuU 
be made more joyous for us by the cares of time? 
"These light afflictions, which are but for a moment, 
work out for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight 
of glory." 



312 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

"Though foes and temptations our progress oppose, 
They only make heaven more sweet at the close, 
Come joy, or come sorrow — the worst may befall, 
One moment in heaven will make up for all." 

If we often go to the grave to lay our dear ones to 
rest, can we not, as we stand there, see the clouds lift 
and just beyond behold an eternal day of unfading, 
splendor ? If we are often tired in life, if we have 
many cares and vexations, if our burden seems more 
than we can bear, shall we not remember how very, very 
short a part of our earthly existence are all the evils 
that life can bring us? As we do not value a babe by 
its present capacities, but by what we see for it in the 
future; so let us not estimate ourselves by what we are 
now, but by the infinite ; all of which we are constitu- 
ent parts. 

An illustration or two will aid us in laying hold of 
the thought we would express and enforce. 

Suppose that two persons are living near each other 
in this life, and one is a professed follower of Jesus, 
while the other is not. The non-professor takes every 
opportunity possible to injure and annoy his believing 
neighbor. ISTow, if that neighbor has been with Christ 
and learned of him, he will feel no resentment — no de- 
sire to return evil for evil — but will, on the contrary, be 
animated by an intense desire to do good for evil, that 
the unbeliever may be won by his deeds of love, and 
be saved from the fearful consequences of his sins; for 
how will his thoughts run if he is moulding his life — 
his earthly life — by a standard that measures eternity 
but thus ? I am being slightly annoyed and worried 
by the evil this man does to me, but the very trib- 
ulation he brings to me, if borne with patience, will be 
a cause of higher joys to me in heaven ; while, if his 



SERMOyS AXD ADDRESSES. 313 

course is continued, lie is heaping to himself wrath against 
the day of wrath, and will suffer indescribable woe 
through all eternity. 

Dear brethren, do you think that the worst effort of 
your worst enemy could very greatly mar our happiness, 
or lead us to hate and injure him? We send the dear- 
est members of our home circles away from us for years 
to go to school that their minds may be cultivated, and 
that they may be better fitted to adorn our households 
when they shall have returned. They are away from us, 
and we have as completely lost their companionship, for 
the time being, as though tliey were dead ; yet we do 
not mourn and weep and break our hearts over the 
present loss, for we look onward to the hour when they 
shall return better prepared to appreciate our affections 
than when they went away. If Ave could realize eternal 
things in the same way, would death be the dark and 
terrible prison-house it seems to us now? Surely not, 
for our lost loved ones ai'C only gone on before, and have 
endless life before we have ; and, are they not waiting 
our coming? And when we meet them over there we will 
wonder that we so deeply grieved for their going over 
before we did — that we grieved so deeply for so short a 
separation. Yes, 

" When onr earthly life is ended, 

And our earthly mission done, 
We shall go across the river 

At the setting of the sun ; 

And in God^s celestial mansion, 

Clad in garments strangely fair, 
We shall meet those gone before us. 

We shall know each other there." 

We shall meet those gone before us, we shall know 
each other there. All our earthly sorrows will almost 

27 



314 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

cease to be sorrows, if we learn not to look on things 
temporal, but on things eternal. 

Some of you may be ready to ask. How shall we 
learn to do this? How shall we get more out of the 
things of sense, and more into the things of faith ? In 
a few words we must sketch a gospel process by which 
this may be done ; for we are warned that our time is 
nearly expired. Little children are to a great extent 
creatures of the present. They live for to-day. They 
give little thought for to-morrow. We begin to teach 
them early to care for the future, and, by a course of 
training and experience, we get them after awhile to 
frame their lives by the idea that they are to enter upon it 
in days to come. But it makes me shudder to think how 
many children are taught, even by Christian parents, to 
provide with great carefulness for that little future which 
the grave will terminate ; while the unending future is 
left very vague and uncertain to their vision, and they 
begin to live as though this life were all. But all your 
talk to children about their coming lives will not enable 
them truly to live with reference to the future. They 
must be put to work. They must begin so to shape 
their lives, that day by day their efforts will improve 
and the future w^ill loom up before them with even more 
than its true proportion. It is just so with a life in 
Christ; we begin by trusting all to Jesus, our faith 
teaching us that he will never disappoint us. Then day 
by day we strive to keep all the time in view our eter- 
nal interests, and day by day we will grow up out of 
earthly cares and environments; and after awhile the 
life we live in the flesh will seem so exceedingly small — 
and stretching away on, and on, and on forever, and 
making all our standard of measurement — we can glory 
in tribulations and stand erect under our heaviest cares, 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 315 

as is becoming children of God and heirs of immor- 
tality. 

May God help us to cast our burdens on the Lord, and 
may we indeed enjoy a life "hid with Christ in God, 
that when He who is our own life shall appear, we may 
appear also with him in glory." 



316 JOHN PACKER mTCHELL. 



BLIISTDED BY THE GOD OF THIS WORLD. 

"_Bu< if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god 
of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of 
the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto 
them."— 2 Cor. iv. 3, 4. 

TuEN our eyes where we will, we see tlie sons of men 
toiling for the future of this life. The youth at college, 
or at the work-bench, is laying up a store of knowledge 
for manhood. The young man is striving to gain a com- 
petence, that when sickness or old age comes upon him, 
the provision he has made may secure him against want 
and suffering. The old who are able still toil on, and 
even those whose steps are tottering and whose work is 
done, look lovingly and hopefully upon the labors of 
their children, and unite with them in their hopes and 
cares for the future. It is characteristic of humanity 
the world over, and one of the attributes of our nature 
is this care and toil for a future we may never see. There 
are few of us, perhaps, who do not take more anxious 
thought for to-morrow than we should do, forgetting 
that " sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." 

But why is it that so many wholly neglect to think 
about and prepare for an eternal future? Why is it that 
a race which provides for the future of this life with 
more care than for the present, should be so careless in 
regard to the wants of a life which must know unspeak- 
able pleasure or indescribable anguish forever? Who can 
tell why yon miser, who stints himself in the necessaries 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 317 

of this life that he may hoard gold for future enjoyment, 
shuts his heart against all thoughts of that endless exist- 
ence in which his gold will not serve him at all? If 
this thing were confined to those who are confessedly 
skeptical, and who see nothing in death but an eternal 
sleep, it would be a question easily answered. But when 
we see so many who respect Christianity and admit its 
claims, and often express an intention to secure a hope 
in Christ before they die, pursuing with all their ener- 
gies the evanescent things of time, it becomes a question 
with no solution outside the word of God. If man is 
subject to no malign influences, how can we account for 
what we see continually, men wearing out body and 
mind before their time to secure what they know death 
will soon rob them of, even w^hile they believe there is a 
treasure which they may lay up where moth and rust do 
not corrupt, nor thieves break through and steal? When 
men believe this, and thus act, the reason stated by the 
Apostle Paul, in the Scripture under consideration, is 
the only one that can possibly be given ; they suffer 
themselves to be influenced by the ^^god of this world. ^' 
Satan employs agencies by which the minds of them that 
believe not are blinded, lest the light of the glorious 
gospel of Christ should shine unto them. 

Is Satan, then, really the power referred to as "the 
god of this world ?'^ In the speech of this same Paul 
before Agrippa, as recorded in the twenty-sixth chapter 
of the Acts of Apostles, he gives us the following as the 
words of Jesus : " I have appeared unto thee for this 
purpose, to make thee a minister and a witness both of 
these things which thou hast seen, and of those things 
in the which I will appear unto thee; delivering thee 
from the people, and from the Gentiles, unto whom now I 
send thee, to open their eyes, and to turn them from 



31 8 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

darkness to liglit, and from the poioer of Satan unto God, 
that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance 
among those that are sanctified by faith that is in me/^ 
The persons of whom the apostle speaks in Corinthians 
as being blinded by the god of this world, are some of 
the very same referred to by the Saviour, as being under 
the power of Satan, and in need of light, so we are right 
sure they were subject to satanic influence, and that it 
was affecting them precisely as Paul says they were 
affected by the god of this world, wdiether the two names 
refer to the same person or not. But we have further 
testimony. The Lord Jesus when nearing the conclusion 
of his work on earth, said: "iS"ow is the judgment of 
this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast 
out'' (John xii. 31). And again, in one of his last con- 
versations with his disciples, he said : " Hereafter I will 
not talk much with you: for the prince of this world 
cometh, and hath nothing in me'' (John xiv. 30). And 
W'hen describing the work to be done by the Holv Spirit, 
he speaks of convincing the world of judgment, '^because 
the prince of this world is judged" (John xvi. 11). 
These, in connection Avith John — ^^For this purpose the 
Son of God w^as manifested, that he might destroy the 
works of the devil" (1 John iii. 8) — prove very conclu- 
sively that the prince of this world and Satan are one 
and the same person. For if the great purpose of the »a| 
manifestation of the Son of God was to destroy the works ^H| 
of the devil, and we find him, when about to consum- 
mate the work, expressing his satisfaction that the prince "^' 
of this world was overcome, we cau not but conclude 5 
that it was one victory over one evil spirit. And w^hen, -^ 
at his interview with Saul of Tarsus, after his glorifica- 
tion at the right hand of God, we find him sending that 
great man to rescue the Gentiles from the power of Satan 



SEEiMONS AND ADDRESSES. 319 

by the preaching of the gospel, and afterwards find the 
apostle ascribing the power to the god of this world 
which Jesus ascribes to Satan, and his victory having 
been over a prince, we can not doubt that these three 
are but different appellations for the same old serpent 
who entered Eden and first introduced sin. 

God had given man '' dominion over fish of the sea, 
and over the fowl of the heaven, and over every living 
thing that moveth upon the earth ^' (Gen. i. 28). By 
the successful temptation of Adam and Eve after this 
dominion had been given, Satan secured it to himself, 
and gained that fearful power which required the humilia- 
tion and death of the Son of God to destroy, and which 
gave Satan the title of prince of this world; but as 
the Avill of man was consulted in the fall, so it is con- 
sulted now in his salvation. Those who prefer the 
heavy chains of the usurping prince to the loving arms 
of the Son of God may continue to wear them. The 
inexhaustible treasures of heaven are offered on the one 
hand by the King who overcame the world and Satan 
and the grave, while only the poor false things of this 
Avorld are offered on the other decision; but very busily 
Satan plies himself to make his offers tempting. Man, if 
uninfluenced by a malign power, would be true to his 
own nature, and bend all his energies to the attainment 
of eternal happiness through Christ, and those who deny 
the existence of any such power will have some trouble 
to account for the strange spectacle of beings, such as 
we are, toiling on to the very brink of the grave for an 
object they can never reach, Avhile the inestimable gift 
of eternal life is wholly neglected. The work of Christ 
has made it possible for man to escape from this terrible 
influence, and it is a very flimsy excuse which some make 
that they are not responsible if they are blinded by a 



320 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

power which is mightier than themselves. No man is so 
weak that he is unconscious of having a will, and the 
very knowledge that all possess the power to do as they 
please is the best proof of the freedom of the will When 
Jesus appears in all his loveliness, and demonstrates his 
willingness and his ability to save from Satan and death 
all who will come to God by him, and a man has sufficient 
power over the pleadings of his own nature for life to 
reject him, he ought no longer to complain that he has 
no will. 

The influence of the devil is not an abstract power ex- 
erted without our knowledge or consent upon the spirit; 
but is wrought through agencies with which we are well 
acquainted. No doubt Paul speaks of Satan as the god of 
this world; because the things of this world and its short- 
lived pleasures are employed by him to win the minds of 
men from the things of heaven and the promise of eter- 
nal life. Look about us and see what it is that wins the 
minds of our friends and neighbors from Christ, and we 
may thus learn the devices of the enemy. One loves to 
enjoy the pleasures of youth, as he calls them, meaning 
those things which he knows are condemned by the Scrip- 
tures; so he delibei^tely chooses to enjoy the pleasures 
of sin for a season, and coolly risks his eternal welfare to 
the chance of living to repent hereafter. Another so 
loves to handle money and see his hoards increase, that he 
purposely stops his ears to all calls of the gospel, and 
flees away when Christ is spoken of, on purpose that he 
may not be interfered with in his money-getting. Another 
has a habit of blaspheming, w^hich it would cost too much 
eflbrt to break up, and so rejects the Saviour, because he 
finds it convenient to use his name in frightful oaths. 
Another feels that it would be humiliating to confess the 
name of Jesus and acknowledge sinfulness, and so allows 



SEB3WNS AND ADDBESSES. 321 

a false and foolish pride to cheat him out of the blessed 
promise that the crowned King of all the universe will 
confess his name at the throne of heaven. Many other 
such reasons might be enumerated why the gospel is so 
often rejected, but they are all of the same class, and 
all put the false and fleeting pleasures of this world 
against the true and everlasting pleasures of heaven. 
Such are the devices of the god of this world by w^hich 
the minds of those that believe not are darkened. Is man 
overcome by an irresistible power, or does his own will, 
freely exercised, exert the strongest influence in causing 
his own blindness? The answer is j)atent, but will be- 
come plainer as we advance with our subject. 

The saying of Paul is — '^ The god of this ivoydd hath 
blinded the minds of them that believe not, lest the light of 
the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should 
shine unto them.^^ This blinding of the mind of them of 
which we have spoken, has a terrible purpose in it. 
Satan is well aAvare of the power of him who was mani- 
fested to destroy his works ; and as a defensive measure, 
he fortifies the minds of those who are willing to serve 
him against the light whose entrance is destructive to his 
domain. 

At a very early period ignorance was spoken of as 
darkness, and w^hatever served to dispel this ignorance 
w^as light. And every mind responds at once to the ac- 
curacy of the figure, and in every written language and 
among all nations, to teach is to enlighten, and those who 
are taught are said to be enlightened. Thus, ive often 
speak of benighted Ethiopia and of enlightened Eng- 
land ; and darkness and light, as applied to the condition 
of the mind, are so commonly used that every body knows 
what is meant just as well as when physical light and 
darkness are spoken of. We say, when w^e see a man 



322 JOHI^ PACKER MITCHELL. 

speculating rashly and exercising little forethought, that 
he is blind to his own interests, and we all understand 
that the blindness is applied to the condition of the mind, 
and not to the animal eye. Indeed, this use of the terms 
light and darkness, sight and blindness, is so common that 
we use them constantly without realizing their figurative 
character. But there is no difficulty in understanding 
what the meaning of the apostle is, if we consider his lan- 
guage in its proper connection. In the beginning of this 
chapter he says : " Therefore, seeing we have this minis- 
try, as we have received mercy, we faint not; but have 
renounced the hidden things of darkness, not walking in 
craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully ; but, 
by manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to 
every man's conscience in the sight of God.'^ The minds 
of men were darkened, that is, they were ignorant, and 
for their enlightenment the truths of the gospel were 
preached to them, and so soon as these truths were appre- 
ciated and accepted, the darkness was dispelled. It is 
worthy of remark that Paul seemed to think the mind of 
man the medium through which the light must reach the 
inner man, and, unlike many theologians of the present 
day, did not expect some mighty internal, spiritual illu- 
mination to change the whole nature of the sinner; but 
considered the gospel hid, and the man lost, unless the 
mind should be relieved from the blindness produced by 
Satan. 

It is alleged by many now that they can not understand 
the gospel, and they make this an excuse for not obeying it ; 
thus reasoning that God will not hold his creature re- 
sponsible for what hef does not know. But such persons 
are like one who should shut himself up in a great house, 
close up all places through which light might gain ad- 
mittance, and then groping in darkness, complain that 



t 



SER3fONS AND ADDRESSES. 323 

the light could not reach him. All around him the glo- 
rious orb of day is pouring its beams, and his fellow-men 
are rejoicing in the genial sunshine while he walks in 
darkness, simply because he will not admit the light. It 
is just so with those who are in spiritual darkness, and 
groping willingly, cry out ! cry out ! " Oh that I could 
receive the light, which is giving life and happiness to so 
many of my fellow-men, but the gospel is so far from me, 
and so hard to be understood, that I must go blindly 
through life, and then step into the fathomless abyss 
with no life and without hope." The light is all around 
them. Its rays are every-where seeking an entrance, and 
they will not admit them. They have closed up all ave- 
nues, and sit in deep spiritual darkness within. 

The Apostle Paul says, nor handling the word of God de- 
ceitfully. His preaching among the Corinthians was a sim- 
ple manifestation of the truth, and that if any failed to re- 
ceive it the blame attached not to the gospel itself, but to 
him who suffered his mind to be blinded by the god of this 
world. The difficulty is not that light is wanting, but 
that, being at hand, it can find no entrance into the be- 
nighted souls thus willingly darkened. God has placed 
the sun in the heavens to enlighten the whole earth, but 
it gives no light to the mole which burrows away from 
it and seeks to avoid its rays; nor to the bat that loves 
darkness and goes not abroad in the day. The very same 
difficulty which Paul encountered in his day, is encoun- 
tered by those who seek to spread the light of the gos- 
pel now, and it is very easy to understand what the 
trouble was then, by observing what it is now. 

We desire to show, in the first place, that the gospel is 
not rejected because it is difficult to understand ; and the 
simple fact that God appointed it as his ^' power unto sal- 
vation to all them that believe " ought to be sufficient to 



324 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

prove this; for it is evident that God has not appointed 
any means to accomplish any purpose for which they are 
inadequate. And since all men are invited to obey the 
gospel, as the means of salvation to each individual, it 
follows necessarily that all are capable of obeying it, or 
else God but mocks us by the invitation. Those who 
would have us believe that it is impossible for some men 
to believe and obey, would put our beneficent Heavenly 
Father in the attitude of one who would place the most 
delicious and inviting food in the sight of one perishing 
of hunger, and invite him to eat, while it is impossible 
for him to reach it. Our Saviour said: ^^Come unto me, 
all ye that labor and are heavy laden ; ^^ and who can be- 
lieve that he who loved us with so great a love could 
mock those for whom his blood was shed by an invita- 
tion to all, which only a feio have jpoiver to obey? He 
gave the true reason why so many fail, when he wept over 
Jerusalem, saying : " O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that 
killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto 
thee, how often would I have gathered thy children to- 
gether, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her 
wings, and ye would not^^ (Matt, xxiii. 37). All, then, 
may obey the gospel; and the reason why they do not is 
not to be imputed to God but to man. The light is 
shining gloriously, but the Avindows of the soul must be 
open to admit its rays, that the darkness may be dispelled. 
But the gospel must not be looked upon as a system 
of theological mysteries, which it requires learning, and 
knowledge, and skill, and years of hard study to under- 
stand. The strifes and controversies of learned men in 
regard to things contained in the Scriptures have, perhaps, 
been fruitful of more evil, and kept the light of the glo- 
rious gospel from more perishing souls than all other 
causes combined. The gospel of salvation is one of the 




SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 325 

plainest things within the knowledge of man. We do not 
mean to say that an ignorant man may know all about 
the i^kilosophy of the gospel, nor do we believe that any 
human being on earth can ever comprehend the mysteries 
which underly the system of redemption. But the facts 
of the gospel are just as plain as any facts known to man, 
and if it had not been for the foolish efforts of philoso- 
phers to explain mysteries instead of preaching facts, 
there never would have been any confusion on the sub- 
ject. 

Like every thing else of which God is the author, 
the gospel is full of things which are beyond our rea- 
son ; but we are not saved by a full comprehension of 
all God's mysteries, but by believing the truth which 
" he manifested,^' and doing what he requires. To re- 
turn once more to the figure of physical light: Suppose 
that a man shuts himself up in a great stone house which 
has no windows and no medium through which light 
may reach him, and there he is spending a miserable 
life in deep darkness and gloom. One goes to him 
from the outer world and tells him of the glorious sun 
in the heavens which is pouring its beams upon the 
earth, and carrying light and gladness wherever it 
shines, and urges him to come forth from his dungeon 
and bask in its rays. "Oh, no,'' says he; "I under- 
stand that learned chemists have been engaged for hun- 
dreds of years in attempts to discover what the sun- 
light is, and there are great differences of opinion 
among them on this important question. I am told 
that some of the wisest of them declare that there are 
many different properties in every single ray of sun- 
shine, and that it may be resolved into seven different 
colors, and there are a great many undetermined ques- 
tions in regard to all the phenomena of light, and I 



326 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

believe I won't risk myself in the sunshine until the 
great men engaged in these examinations have fully 
decided what really is the whole truth in the case." 
Such a man would exclude himself from the light for- 
ever, and perish, as all things must, when deprived of 
the sun, and, when dead, the speculations of philoso- 
phers would be just as vigorously pushed as ever; but 
let him come forth into the light, let him turn his 
back upon the darkness, and he would be just as much 
blessed by the sunshine as though philosophers had 
fully and finally determined all about it they would 
like to know. It is just so with the gospel. The glo- 
rious Sun of Righteousness has been pouring his life- 
giving rays upon the earth for eighteen hundred years, 
and millions upon millions of Adam's race have been 
blessed with happiness and eternal life through Jesus 
Christ, not one of whom could determine all the ques- 
tions which philosophers might raise in regard to the 
plan of redemption. Learned and great men have been \\ 
engaged all these years in efforts to develop more than 
God has developed in his word, and not one of them 
has been successful. But the salvation is nigh as it 
was in the days of Peter and John and Paul, and is 
reached by a simple, humble acceptance of the truths 
taught, not by understanding all mysteries. All the 
reasoning and philosophizing of all the great men who 
have lived during eighteen centuries have not added a 
single aid to the plain gospel, nor saved one single 
soul from death. It is now as when Paul preached in 
Corinth — salvation is in Christ and hina crucified. All 
the strife and persecution and bloodshed which have 
occurred about the relation of Christ to the Father, and 
of the Spirit to both, and of all three to man, have not 
added a new truth to that revealed eighteen hundred 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 327 

years ago ; and, thank God, they have not taken aAvay 
any of the power which all three of these united in 
putting forth in order to salvation then. As the scien- 
tific investigations of man have not affected the sun, which 
gives forth her light as freely and as joyously as when 
she first ruled the day; so all the speculations of relig- 
ionists have not in any manner changed the gladening 
light which shines in the face of Jesus Christ. The 
fact that Jesus was God manifest in the flesh — that he 
is the Son of God and Son of man — is a fact which may 
be apprehended just as easily as any other. There is 
no necessity of our understanding any thing about how 
his nature was made up, or where the Divine nature met 
with the human in him to constitute Immanuel. It is 
simply to believe that he was and is the Son of God 
and the Saviour of sinners ; and, believing this, to ren- 
der him obedience as one to whom all authority in 
heaven and on earth is given. To believe this is to 
believe the gospel, and to obey this is to obey the 
gospel. 

We believe that if we eat wholesome food it will 
sustain life, and we act upon this belief, and procure 
and eat such food, though no human wisdom has ever 
been able to fathom the whole process of digestion and 
assimilation. The real necessity is that we accept and 
use the blessings of God in the manner he has ordained, 
and they will accomplish the designed end whether we 
know ho^v they do it or not. It is right to study the 
Scriptures, and to learn all we can about God and his 
dealings with men, just as it is right for us to study 
and know what we can about ourselves. But the anato- 
mist who has dissected a thousand bodies, and knows 
every nerve and muscle and bone and organ in the 
human body, is no more benefited by food than the 



328 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

ignorant peasant who scarcely knows he has a stomach. 
The humble disciple of the Lord Jesus who, on simple 
faith, accepts and obeys him, is as securely saved as 
though he had learned all the theories and speculations 
of all the philosophers from the time of the apostles 
until now. 

When will the world learn this, and cease to specu- 
late about God's w^ork instead of performing their own ? 
When will preachers of the gospel cease to preach 
doctrines instead of Christ ? The apostle John says : 
"And this is the record, that God hath given to us 
eternal life, and this life is in his Son^' (1 John v. 11). 
This life is not in the doctrine of the Trinity, as set 
forth in creeds, not in the doctrine of eternal election, 
and not in any other doctrine of the metaphysical 
schools, but in the Lord Jesus Christ ; and we are made 
one with him, not by belief in a doctrine, but in a 
person, and that person the Son of God. Oh ! that 
all might come to a knowledge of this glorious truth, 
and cease to distract their minds with questions they 
can not and need not understand; and reposing implicit 
and unwavering faith in the Lord who loved us and 
bought us with his own blood, render him full and 
unreserved obedience unto everlasting life. 

The whole world lay in darkness; human reason had 
exhausted itself in attempts to penetrate the mysteries 
of the spirit world; God had revealed himself as a 
being of infinite power, justice and purity, and this 
revelation had shown man his own weakness, ignorance 
and unrighteousness, and revealed the great gulf which 
lay between him and God. Those who had no revela- 
tion from God to guide them, were feeling an impen- 
etrable darkness, and finding no God but those formed 
by their own excited and anxious imaginations, while 



SERMONS AND ADDHESSES 329 

those who knew most of God and spiritual things were 
crying out from the depths of a despairing, smitten 
soul : " Oh ! wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver 
me from the body of this death ?'^ Then God assumed 
human flesh in the person of Jesus Christ; and, instead 
of pointing out to us in words all he wanted us to know, 
it was demonstrated in acts. All the languages of all 
the earth might have been exhausted in the attempt to 
teach us the love of God for man, and it never could 
have been taught as it was in the gift of his Son. The 
Saviour did not philosophize about his love for man, 
but he demonstrated it; he did not speculate on his 
power, but he showed it before men's eyes by mighty 
works. He did not seek to teach the philosophy of a 
resurrection from among the dead, but he rose from the 
dead. His work was not the forming of theories, but 
the actual accomplishment of great ends. He clothed 
himself in flesh ; he carried a human body through a 
weary human life ; he trod the deepest depths of human 
sorrow; he walked in the midst of the most tremendous 
temptations ; he descended into the dark domain of 
death — down into the gloom and the blackness where 
the race of Adam had disappeared to return no more, 
during four thousand years; he grappled with the mon- 
ster in his own domain ; he led captivity captive from 
his own chosen battle-ground ; and, coming forth from 
among the dead, he ascended far above all principality 
and power, until he carried our humanity and seated it 
on the throne of God. Thus he brought life and im- 
mortality to light; and, in his presence, all spiritual dark- 
ness flees away. 

Fellow-mortals, do you believe these things concerning 
Jesus? If you do, you believe the whole gospel. Are 
you ready to accept him for your Saviour in the way 
28 



330 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

he has appointed? If you are, you are ready to obey 
the gospel ; to receive remission of sins ; to be made 
heirs of eternal life ; to pass the bounds of the kingdom 
of darkness, and rest in the glorious beams of the Sun 
of Righteousness. 



SEEUONS AND ADDRESSES. 331 



ADDEESS, 



While every thing indicates that man was made for a 
better life and a higher development than this world af- 
fords him, every thing indicates also that he must have 
help from beyond if these things are to be obtained. 
All things are of God. His mind conceived the idea of 
the universe before a single star had glimmered in space, 
and while chaotic night and unbroken stillness reigned 
supreme where now are seen the shining hosts of heaven 
in their grand march, and where we hear the sublime 
harmony of God's wonderful creation. A man, who by 
long study has stored his mind with knowledge, if he 
employ that mind in the direction to which it is natur- 
ally inclined, will produce something new and strange 
and marvelous to his fellow-men whose minds have not 
been employed as his. And if we take all the ingenious 
and skillful machinists who are to-day engaged in work- 
ing upon curious machines, which the world has never 
seen, and which in their completion and perfection exist 
as yet in the minds of the originators only, we shall find 
these originators taxed to their utmost tension, and every 
faculty called upon for the completion of the great de- 
sign. Suppose one of these men should take us into his 
confidence, and endeavor to have our minds grasp and 
comprehend all that was working in his, how much 



332 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

could we be made to understand of these things which 
his brain had worked upon for weary years? We would 
be like little children to him; and, in the particular de- 
partment in which he toiled, he would be to us as a 
giant. The things which are so perfectly plain to him 
would be incomprehensible to us; and the working out 
of his plans, which are to produce some useful and 
wonderful piece of mechanism, would be to us all mys- 
tery just because we are ignorant of the things he has 
learned. What presumption would it be if we should 
go into his workshop telling him how to best get on 
with his labor! We might show him that he had a 
wire or a rivet or a wheel too many in some places, in 
others he had not enough, and we might even go to 
work to fix these things for him; and when we had 
our pieces all fixed up to suit our own ideas, we might 
even undertake to put them in their places in the ma- 
chine, but do you think he would permit us to carry out 
our purpose and go to tinkering with his work? I know 
if I were such a machinist, and any man should under- 
take that kind of work, I would not only prevent him, 
from his meddling, but I would turn him out of my 
shop. 

But the most gifted and highly educated intellect on 
earth is only human. A mind which overtowers our 
own in its grasp of thought is only like ours, only more 
fully developed. There is a mind which is not devel- 
oped, which never can develop ; but which always was 
and ever will be infinite in every attribute of complete 
perfection. It grasps all infinity at a glance, and to it 
every thing is known that can be known. It is the 
mind of God. In this mind was conceived the mighty 
plan which includes in it all that has been done in the 
past and all that will be done in the future throughout all 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 333 

eternity. The work upon this vast design is going on 
from day to day, and none but the eternal God can 
grasp and comprehend it in all its far-reaching conse- 
quences, yet we know it is an end worthy of God; yea, 
it was worthy the humiliation and death of his beloved 
and only-begotten Son; and we know that when it is 
completed, all who have faithfully served the great de- 
signer will be supremely, inexpressibly happy through 
countless, endless ages. In carrying out the work, God 
made us what we are — men and women — and he needs 
us to labor upon his work, and he has so arranged all 
our parts that we are able to do what he requires of us, 
and he asks us to do what he requires of us, and he asks 
that we shall do that which we are fitted for. Now if 
some boy, w^ho is learning a trade in a machine-shop, 
shall take it into his head that he can make something 
better fitted for its place in a piece of work an inventor 
had given him for working upon than the thing de- 
scribed in the written specification of the master-work- 
man, the boy will fall into disgrace, and perhaps lose his 
place in the shop. Yet how much higher does God\s 
mind tower above the mightiest mind of man above 
that of the boy. But men walk up to the mighty work 
which has so long been dear to God, and upon which he 
has spent so much labor, and weighing the whole thing 
in their own minds, conclude, 

" Here he gives too little, there too much," 

and while resolved to labor on the work, they resolve, 
also, that they will labor in their own way. Now, my 
friends, what do you think of this way of treating God ? 
Can we believe that w^ork thus done will be accepted 
and assigned a place forever when the glorious end God 
has in view shall have been attained? We desire to be 



334 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

charitable. I believe, by the grace of God, we are char- 
itable; and I feel that this very charity we have requires 
of us that we should solemnly and carefully point out 
to our fellow-mortals the mistake into which they are 
falling. Our work and our manner of working is not 
a matter of choice with us ; and, if a man work earnestly 
and zealously and faithfully in a wrong direction, his very 
earnestness and zeal and faith require that we should en- 
deavor to set him right. The truth is, God has a great 
end to be accomplished. He has employed upon his work 
angels and men who are capable of understanding their 
own labors, and he himself, with all his mighty power, is 
working at the same great end or design. We can not 
comprehend the work he is doing, for it fills his own 
infinite mind. We can not comprehend the work he has 
assigned to angels; we can not comprehend where and 
how our own work is to be fitted into the finished 
structure ; but we must conclude that if our work is 
not finished according to the plans and specifications 
set forth in God's Book — the Bible — it is impossible that 
it shall find a place in the perfect structure that is being 
reared. We endeavored, not long since, to contrast the 
result of our efforts to penetrate the mysteries of God 
with a result reached by simple faith in God and implicit 
obedience to him ; and no lesson more striking can be 
imparted to us than this. For the Egyptians were great 
in all that constitutes human greatness, and in trying by 
wisdom to find out God, they lost all. Abraham was 
w^eak in all that makes up human strength, but he was 
"strong in faith,'' and so he gained all; he was called 
"the friend of God.'' 

Whatever we are ignorant of is mysterious to us. 
Having no hope that we shall ever know all that God 
knows, it must follow that we shall always have mystery 



! ! 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 335 

about us. When I was a boy and understood common 
arithmetic pretty well, but not acquainted with any of the 
higher branches of mathematics, my father would make 
surveys of parcels of land having many lines bounding 
them. He would construct a paper by making lines and 
spaces convenient for tabling the survey. He would 
take from a book the northings and southings, the east- 
ings and westings, place them in the spaces on his tabling 
paper; then I could add the columns to see whether they 
balanced, that was as far as I could go. Father would 
then form a column of meridian distances. Again this 
was all mystery to me. Then he would tell me to mul- 
tiply the northings, which Avere on a line with any me- 
ridian distance on the same line. This I could do, for 
I was good in multiplication. Then I must multiply all 
the southings by all the meridian distances on the same 
line, etc. The things that I understood how to do, that 
I could and did do, with unwavering faith that my 
father understood all ; and, that if we made no mistakes 
in our work, the result would be infallibly correct. I 
never thought of telling my father that I could do any 
of the work, because I did not understand all. I was 
surrounded by and mixed up with mystery; nevertheless, 
confidence in my father, and in his comprehension of 
those parts that were mysterious to me, moved me with- 
out debate or any misgivings to work at the parts as- 
signed me in ascertaining the contents of the survey. 
Had I refused to do the work assigned me because I 
did not understand all about the parts which consti- 
tuted the whole, would I have been a faithful and 
dutiful child? Certainly not, is the answer of every one. 
So with regard to the God of the universe. He sees, 
knows and comprehends the. whole, and all the minutiae 
of all the parts. He has assigned to us nothing but 



336 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

what we can easily do. We must have confidence in 
him, and attend to the part he has enjoined upon us. 
It is God who works in us — both to will and to do his 
pleasure. Observe, "To will and to do his pleasure.^' 
Not to will to wait till we comprehend the mystery of 
God and Ms work ; but simply to will to do, and then do 
the things God commands us to do. We can know and 
comprehend but comparatively little while confined to 
the present state of being ; but there is an unending fu- 
ture in which to learn and comprehend more and more, 
and a future in which we may rise higher and higher 
without ever reaching the apex of moral and intellectual 
elevation. 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 337 



THE WEAKNESS OF GOD IS STRONGER THAN 

MAN. 

" For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom : but 
we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the 
Greeks foolishness; unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, 
Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Because the foolish- 
ness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than 
men."— 1 Cor. i. 22-25. 

It is saddening, as Avell as curious, to observe the efforts 
of those who deny the truth of the Christian religion, to 
get rid of the great historic facts concerning its founder, 
and concerning the religion itself for upward of eighteen 
centuries. It is sad to reflect that poor mortals, sur- 
rounded by care and trial and doomed to inevitable death, 
should want to destroy the only hope the world can ever 
have of a life beyond the grave; that when humanity 
has been furnished with a hope sought for every-where — 
sought for in vain before Christ appeared in the world, 
our fellow-mortals should seek to dash from us the long- 
coveted and glorious prize. Even taking the darkest 
view of the subject in which we can look at it, if Chris- 
tianity is all a delusion ; if our faith is vain, and we are 
following "cunningly devised fables,'^ it is unkind and 
cruel for men to rob us of the hope that is within us; for, 
false or true, it lifts us above all the cares and afflictions 
of life. It gives us happiness in the midst of tribulation 
and trial, and stands like a radiant morning star, illumin- 
ating the dark night of death, and giving promise of a 
coming day whose fadeless glory shall shine forever. In 
view of this, why should any one seek to believe, or try to 
29 



S38 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

induce others to believe, that there is no truth in our re- 
ligion ? Even supposing the proof at hand, to demon- 
strate its falsity, what good in destroying in the hearts 
of all who hold it — faith in Jesus Christ? If it be but 
a delusion, it has done more for the happiness of man in 
this life than all the truths upon which men rely with so 
much conlidence ; and if to secure happiness is the prime 
purpose of every life, why not let us hug a delusion to 
our hearts, if delusion it be, which gives a happiness 
which neither life nor death can weaken nor destroy ? 
But sadder still to those who, by doing God^s will, have 
learned of the doctrine that it is from God, is the knowl- 
edge that so many make shipwreck of precious souls upon 
the shallow reefs of human wisdom; when the fathomless 
ocean of God^s truth invites them to safe sailing, and a 
peaceful and happy voyage to a haven of eternal rest. 

But it is curious to study the opposition which Christi- 
anity has met, and see how the most powerful efforts of 
human wisdom have been brought to naught by the sim- 
plicity of the gospel. And it is curious, too, that infidelity 
still persists in the effort to overthrow that system which 
eighteen hundred years of war have only strengthened. 
The history of the long struggle ought to be sufficient to 
convince all enemies of our faith, not only of the foolish- 
ness of their opposition, but of the truth of that which 
has withstood tha attacks of heathenism, of human phi- 
losophy, and of all forms in which infidelity has mani- 
fested itself from the appearance of the Saviour among 
men until the present hour. When we contrast the means 
which have been used to propagate Christianity with those 
which have been used to destroy it from the world, it 
seems a wonder that all rational men have not long ago 
been convinced that there was something more than hu- 
man in a system, which, by the very weaknesses that in- 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 339 

vite attack upon it, overcome all the arts and policies of 
human wisdom, and flourishes more gloriously by the very 
warfare it is forced to urge. 

Let us examine for a moment what the means are, in 
the eye of human wisdom, upon which the success of 
Christianity depends. 

In the first place, we find the Author of our religion to 
be one Jesus of Nazareth, a very humble personage, and 
possessed of none of the advantages of education, of 
worldly position, or of family connection. It would be 
har<l to conceive of one less likely to revolutionize so- 
ciety, and " draw all men after him,'^ than he. who at his 
own home, was known as the son of Joseph the carpen- 
ter. When his work commenced at his baptism in the 
Jordan, and the astounding miracle occurred of the de- 
scent of the Holy Spirit, and the voice of Jehovah declar- 
ing "this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased," 
astonished the thousands that had come to hear the elo- 
quent prophet John, he began to have greatness and im- 
portance which even the most worldly could not fail to 
recognize. And when in Cana of Galilee he turned water 
into wine, and then began to display his superhuman 
power by the most stupendous miracles — by opening the 
eyes of the blind, by unsealing the ears of the deaf, by 
casting out demons, and by giving life to the dead — it 
would not be difficult to conceive that he might have con- 
nected himself with any of the political parties among his 
countrymen, and in the briefest time have seated him- 
self on the throne of David, Just such a movement as 
this would human policy have dictated, and that no such 
movement was made has been a source of objection to him 
on the part of all infidels up to the present time. In- 
stead of selecting his followei's from among the great ones 
of earth, from those in official position and commanding 



340 JOHN PACKEH MITCHELL. 

large influence, he chose his disciples from among the 
most humble and illiterate people of his native land ; in 
company with them continued to tread the most humble 
paths. But both they and he performed the most wonder- 
ful works. The eyes of the whole nation were attracted to 
them, and the way Avas wide open for all of them to 
advance to the most exalted position that could be attained 
by men in this life. The disciples all realized this, and 
expected their Master to lead them to glory, honor, and 
wealth. The mother of two of them requested that her 
sons might have chief positions in his kingdom. But 
now, when all this was apparent, Jesus began to an- 
nounce the end towards which his life was tending. In- 
stead of looking forward toward a diadem and a throne, 
he saw before him the cross and the grave. Instead of 
glory and ease, he saw shame, ignominy, and an agoniz- 
ing death. Instead of rewards and eartlily ease for his 
followers, he saw toil, tribulation, and martyrdom. We 
are looking now with the eye of the world. The fact 
that our Lord could penetrate the future with pro- 
phetic vision, and behold the transcendent glory, the 
bliss, the immortality, the ineffable pleasures of the mill- 
ions on millions who should be redeemed by his blood, 
has nothing to do with our present examination. We de- 
sire to see the historic acts and scenes of our Saviour's life 
as they would be by one who had not the slightest inti- 
mation of the design to build a glorious spiritual house on 
him as the chief corner-stone. 

The short career of Jesus closes in a terrible death. 
The charge of blasphemy against the God of the Jews; 
of treason against Csesar ; the mock trial ; the merciless 
mob; the cross; the cruel spear which cleft his heart, 
and the new tomb hewn in a rock, are the principal 
features of the scenes which terminates the life of Jesus 



SER3fONS AND ADDRESSES. 341 

of Nazaretli. Fifty days roll away, and Jerusalem is 
undisturbed by any commotion in regard to him who 
bad stirred the hearts of all Israel to their utmost depths. 
And now a scene approaches which, more than all others 
in the history of the Christian religion, shows how won- 
derfully God operates to bring strength out of weak- 
ness ; how truly he hath chosen " the weak things of 
the world to confound the things that are mighty." Let 
us put ourselves in a position, as nearly as we can, to 
look upon it in its true aspect. The record which we 
have in the New Testament of what was done by the 
disciples after our Lord was buried, and of what was 
done by the risen Saviour among them until he was 
taken up into heaven, was not yet written. None 
of these things was of a public character, and none 
of them calculated to attract much attention from the 
world. True, the astounding miracle of the earth- 
quake, the rending open of the sealed sepulcher, the 
coming forth of him who had been three days buried, 
must have produced considerable commotion when the 
terrified soldiers ran into the city and reported what 
they had witnessed. But we know they were bribed 
to falsely state that the disciples had stolen and taken 
away the body of Jesus while they slept, so all excite- 
ment in regard to the matter was quieted for the time. 
As time rolled away nothing more was heard of Christ or 
his followers. How they must have rejoiced who had 
conspired to put him to death by crucifixion in the 
thought that they had effectually and forever rid them- 
selves of all difficulty in the matter! The better part 
of two months rolls away, and still no tidings reach 
the great world of what was going on among the hum- 
ble ones who were waiting for the fulfillment of their 
Master's promise to send them another Comforter ; and 



342 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

who dreamed as little probably as their enemies did as 
to how greatly the whole world was to be shaken by 
the events soon to transpire. But we must bear in 
mind that the promise of the Holy Spirit was known 
only to the disciples, and that no eflPort had been made 
to make disciples or converts to the new faith, and no 
preaching on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. But 
now, in God's own time, the Advocate, whom the 
Saviour had promised to send the disciples, makes his 
descent from heaven to the earth, and a new phase is 
brought to view of the grand picture upon which we 
have been looking. Let us look at it as we would if 
we had no knowledge of the previous promise, and no 
conception of the work that was to be done in the name 
of Jesus. 

There is an assembly of the poor and despised fol- 
lowers of one who had been put to death between two 
thieves, and buried fifty days before ; the leaders among 
them are men from Galilee, without education or re- 
finement, accustomed to the rudest sort of people and 
the roughest kind of life, with the prejudice of the 
whole Jewish nation against them, and without any 
earthly circumstances in their favor. The people of 
Galilee were looked upon with contempt by the learned 
and refined Jews about Jerusalem. They had a barba- 
rous language ; and we remember that Peter was be- 
trayed by his speech when he sought to deny all con- 
nection with his persecuted Lord. What a company 
was this to announce to Israel and the learned and 
refined Greeks and Romans — the only ^^name given un- 
der heaven and among men whereby we must be saved." 
What human wisdom would have selected such a band 
for such a work ! The sound from heaven, " like a 
rushing mighty wind,'' was known to the disciples only. 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 343 

The first intimation others had of the wonderful events 
that were transpiring, was the speaking of the apostles 
in languages they had never learned. This was soon 
noised abroad, and the multitude began to crowd to 
the place where these astonishing things were occurring. 
And now the name of Jesus began to have an impor- 
tance wholly unknown while he was on earth, and a 
power was working which was destined to revolution- 
ize all human society. Again the power is in the 
hands of the disciples to advance their own interests, 
and make themselves great among men; for the miracle 
which was exciting all the dwellers in Jerusalem would 
have made it possible for them to have become leaders 
of their countrymen in almost any worldly enterprise. 
But see, once more, how they turn aside from all this 
and preach, as the foundation of a new religion, the 
wonderful fact that Jesus was risen from the dead, and 
was the real author of the wonders which the people 
saw and heard. Surely this crowns all! To preach 
salvation to all who are willing to receive it in the 
name of a dead man, and to require a belief in this 
fact as the first step toward attaining it, was indeed 
setting at naught the wisdom of man, and building 
upon a foundation which man could never have laid, 
nor even have dreamed of the possibility of laying. 
But we need not follow the gospel in its first glorious 
triumphs in the city of Jerusalem. We need not trace 
its progress, as multitudes accepted the truth of the 
facts related by the apostles, until a vast congregation 
was gathered together in the name of the Lord, and 
the priests began to say, " You want to bring this 
man^s blood upon us.^' The facts which come before us 
in this brief view are historical, and do not depend 
upon the Scripture narrative alone — for that, within 



344 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

six moiitlis after the crucifixion of Jesus, thousands 
upon thousands of Jews were gathered together in his 
name, is a truth as well attested as that an emperor 
was then reigning at Eome. How will infidelity rid 
itself of this one fact? How w^ill those Avho deny the 
superhuman power of the gospel account for the scenes 
of the pentecost immediately following Christ^s death 
and the period succeeding? They can do it only by 
ascribing to weak, unlettered men the power which we 
ascribe to God. How strange it is that weak faith will 
"choose the harder side!^^ How simple and natural all 
these things are when we ascribe them to the infinitely 
great One who created all things by his word and sus- 
tains them by his will! And how utterly inadequate 
and absurd are all other theories by which men seek 
to account for the marvelous things which were said 
and done by the despised, ignorant and persecuted band 
of Galilean fishermen ! 

What human wisdom could have foreseen that the 
grand triumph of the faith of Jesus Christ, under the 
preaching of the uulearned and undistinguished men Avho 
first preached salvation throughout all Judea, would fur- 
nish proof of the divinity of the religion which gained 
such triumphs under such circumstances which no rea- 
sonable being could resist? The disciples who had 
hoped for so much through Christ, while they expected 
him to establish an earthly kingdom, and cover them 
and himself with the pomp and glory of this world — 
while they found their hopes all disappointed and their 
dreams all shattered when their Master expired on the 
cross — had now found a new hope, which all the thrones 
and kingdoms on earth could not purchase from them. 
With the eye of faith they beheld a new glory which 
outshone in splendor the stars of heaven. They had 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 345 

learned by experience the perfect happiness and peace 
one might enjoy in this life by obedience to Jesus 
Christ ; and now a storm was approaching which would 
show them how the gospel gave them a hope and hap- 
piness wiiich the worst of life's ills could not mar, and 
which death itself made only the more glorious. 

The frantic Jews, driven to desperation by the tri- 
umphs of the new religion, founded, as they were, on 
the very death they had inflicted upon its founder, rose 
up with fixed determination to destroy it from the earth. 
They found that no logic could resist the power with 
which one Stephen, '^ a man full of faith and of the 
Holy Spirit,'^ preached the gospel of Jesus Christ. All 
the learning of the sanhedrim was employed against 
him in vain. The weakness of God was stronger than 
men, and they turned against him the physical power 
which they had, and stoned him to death. But once 
more, observe how God turned all the power of man 
into weakness, and the weakness of his people into 
mighty power. What disciple could look upon the tri- 
umphant departure of Stephen, to the glories which 
awaited him in the presence of his Lord without ac- 
quiring a new impulse in the good work? Before this 
they had only experienced how Christianity prepared 
men to live ; they knew now, by a most forcible example, 
how it prepared them to die. The Lord Jesus who 
had ascended from their sight and sent them another 
Comforter, was ready to receive his followers to the 
glory he had with the Father before the world was. 
The glorious vision of the opened heavens, and Jesus 
standing at the right hand of God beholding the dying 
Stephen, has filled Christ's followers with delight and 
hope from that day until now. It was as if Jesus had 
risen up to receive the spirit of his dying servant. In 



346 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

other places in the Scriptures, as has been remarked by 
an ancient writer, he is represented as sitting; but to 
the eye of Stephen he appeared standing. If we love 
Jesus and serve him, he loves us and constantly watches 
over us ; and when, amid the pangs of death, our soul 
is about to wing its flight to the blissful abode of the 
saints in light, the interest of our Lord in heaven is 
excited for us, so that he leaves the seat in glory to 
welcome us home. Thank God for the vision of our 
brother, who fell asleep under direful persecution eight- 
een centuries ago. 

But something more than this was WTOught out of the 
weakness, of the persecuted disciples. The fury of the 
Jews was fierce, and their determination to exterminate 
the new ^^sect^^ very stubborn, so that they Avere scat- 
tered abroad all over their native land. But it was like 
scattering the brands of a blazing building among the 
houses of a great city, ^yherever the disciples went they 
preached the word, and soon reports began to flow into 
Jerusalem of the triumphs of the gospel in Damascus, 
Antioch, in Samaria, until the whole land seemed to be 
occupied by the followers of the Nazarene who had been 
put to death. Then Saul of Tarsus, a man highly educated 
in the wisdom of the Jews, being exceedingly zealous for the 
religion of his fathers, procures authority to go down to Da- 
mascus, and bring Christians, both men and women, bound 
to Jerusalem. We need not detail the events which trans- 
pired resulting in his becoming an apostle of the Lord he had 
persecuted. They are familiar to us all ; but let it be re- 
marked well, that this learned and powerful advocate of the 
cause of Christ did not become a disciple until the weakness 
of the Galilean band, in despite of all the wisdom, and power, 
and prestige of the Jews, had planted the standard of the 
cross throughout all the land of Israel. But now the 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 347 

services of the wonderfully energetic and able Saul 
being enlisted in the cause he had persecuted, one might 
expect to see some mixture of worldly wisdom blended 
with the simple gospel, which the ignorant Simon Peter 
had first preached in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost. 
If the opinions of men had been consulted, how certainly 
would human philosophy have blended with the simple, 
plain and unadorned preaching of the gospel of the cruci- 
fied Jesus. How surely would the learning of the gifted 
Paul have supplied whatever in the eye of human learn- 
ing was lacking in the preaching of the uncultivated 
and uneducated fisherman ! Let infidelity account, if it 
can, for the conversion of this brilliant Jew, and the de- 
votion of his whole life to the cause of Christ, without 
any compensation, or the slightest hope of any in this 
life. How shall we account for the yielding up of all the 
splendid prospects which lay before this man — fame, 
honor, glory and wealth, which his attainments so well qual- 
ified him to attain and win from his nation — and the con- 
secration of all his powers to the service of a despised 
cause, which had neither wealth, nor fame, nor worldly 
honor to give? AThere shall we find a motive to induce 
a man to live the life of toil and suffering that he lived, 
and to rejoice in a crown of martyrdom as he did, if 
we deny the truth of his own statement, that Jesus Christ 
appeared to him in person as he journeyed to Damascus, 
and convinced him of the truth of the gospel? But when 
the skeptic has, to his own satisfaction, accounted for 
this, a new wonder stands before him more difficult still. 
The learned and gifted pupil of Gamaliel, thoroughly 
conversant with all the mazes of Greek philosophy, and 
carefully instructed in all the laws and traditions of the 
Jews, preaches every-where the same plain, simple gospel, 
which, from the mouth of the uneducated Peter, had 



348 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

pierced tlie hearts of three thousand people when first 
spoken. Paul must have been influenced by one of two 
motives; he either expected to glorify himself, and make 
his name great among men, or else believed the gospel, 
and preached it because he was convinced that ^^con- 
straint was upon him^' so to preach. If the first motive 
controlled him, why did he preach what he knew to be 
"to the Jews a stumbling-block, and to the Greeks 
foolishness?^^ Why did he not blend the gospel with 
the wisdom which he so eminently possessed, in such a 
manner as to make it acceptable to the Greeks, and so 
accommodate it to the prejudices and traditions of the 
Jews, which he so well understood, as to satisfy and 
proselyte all nations? It is utterly impossible, in view 
of PauPs history and labors, to entertain any other idea 
than that Paul acted from any other motive, than the 
most certain conviction of the truth of that which he 
preached. He did see the Lord Jesus Christ, long after 
his ascension into heaven, and though the sight was so 
transcendently glorious as to produce physical blindness, 
it penetrated his great soul with a light which had never 
dawned upon it before. He preached the gospel of 
Christ simply, plainly — unmixed with a single sentence 
of his own philosophy — because he knew that while to 
the Jews it was a stumbling-block, and to the Greeks 
foolishness, to those who received Christ it was the 
"powder of God and the wisdom of God.^' He knew 
that it was to those that believed it, ^'the power of 
God unto salvation.^^ 

We have an expression of Paul in this same chapter, 
which forcibly states his own reason for preaching as he 
did, and to which all who profess to preach what he did 
will do well to take heed : " For Christ sent me not to 
baptize but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, 



SERMONS AND ADDBFSSES. 349 

lest the cross of Christ should he made of non-effect. ^^ Oh, 
that the lesson here taught might be taken to heart by all 
now, that no " wisdom of words " might ever be per- 
mitted to obscure the glory and the hope which are 
fixed upon tlie cross of Christ, the crucified ! Oh, that all 
would read and learn that it is not a philosophy which 
saves us, not any effort of a cultivated human mind, but 
the simpleness which was anciently preached concerning 
the life, death, resurrection and glorification of Jesus 
Christ of Nazareth. Admitting^ what is probably true, 
that Peter and his brethren, who first preached Christ 
crucified, had not the educational attainments to reduce 
the faith to a system of philosophy, even had they been 
disposed so to do, we have now a man before us emi- 
nently qualified for this work — certainly as well qualified 
as any who would presume to undertake the task in 
modern times. 

Now he knew exactly how the human mind longed to 
solve the mysteries of the existence of God ; he knew 
how human reason would seek to grasp the nature and 
existence of three in one; he knew how men would like 
to comprehend all about the necessity there was for the 
death of God's Son; and he well foresaw that all who 
heard the story of the cross would seek to fathom the 
depths of the divine wisdom, justice and mercy which 
met and were all satisfied when the expiring Jesus of 
Nazareth cried out, "It is finished!" His reference to 
many of these things in his writings show plainly that 
he was well aware of their existence. We know how 
very anxious he was for the success of the cause ; how 
he was worn down by unceasing toil, and wearied 
almost beyond endurance ; the care of the churches came 
daily upon him — certainly he will carefully write out all 
that is to be received as orthodox concerning all the mys- 



350 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

terious tilings wliich God has not seen fit clearly to re- 
veal, in order that the minds of all may be at rest, and 
that no shade of difference in opinion may exist among 
the followers of the Lord. If such a thing inust be 
done at all, why not by the Apostle Paul, above all 
other human beings? If a creed or articles of faith 
deciding these questions are necessary at all to a proper 
organization of the Church of Christ, surely this great 
man — this wonderful preacher — ^this powerful preacher — 
this apostle, inspired by the Spirit of God, by the Holy 
Spirit — will settle the question forever; but he does 
nothing of the kind. He continues to preach Christ 
and him crucified, and his letters contain only plain, 
simple directions for the government of the lives of the 
crucified one. Not for near three hundred years after 
the great apostle of nations had been sleeping on the 
banks of the Tiber did the wisdom of men come to 
think itself wiser than the ^'foolishness of God,'^ and 
bind its opinions on the church in regard to those sub- 
jects which, in PauPs time, had been left in the un- 
fathomable depths of God's untaught mysteries. 

How plain and simple and beautiful the gospel be- 
comes when left as it was as preached by Paul ! How 
easy for the most humble, untaught mind to comprehend 
the plain statement of the few though vastly important 
facts which, under PauFs definition, constitutes the gos- 
pel. Turning over to the fifteenth chapter of this same 
epistle, we find his enumeration in detail of things he 
preached in Corinth, under "the gospel:" "Moreover, 
brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached 
unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye 
stand; by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in mem- 
ory what I have preached unto you, unless ye have be- 
lieved in vain. For I delivered unto you first of all 



i 



i 



SER3[0NS AND ADDRESSES. 351 

that which I also received, how that Christ died for our 
sins, according to the Scriptures : and that he was buricdj 
and that he rose again the third day, according to the 
Scriptures/' 

What a strange and fearful perversion of the primitive 
mode it is when men at this day make a mystery of the 
gospel, and represent the truths of Jesus Christ as un- 
attainable by the common mind until some one '^called 
and sent,'' has illuminated them by his wisdom ! In 
what an unfavorable light it presents to us our heavenly 
Father; and, alas! how many perishing souls are driven 
into infidelity by it. Oh ! that all would turn to the 
pure and simple gospel proclaimed by Paul, and there 
become acquainted with that which is "the power of 
God unto salvation." They would there learn, too, that 
there had been no attempt made on God's part to reveal 
to man all the mysteries connected with the being of the 
eternal; that there had been no such folly as an attempt 
to make the finite contain the infinite. There was one 
purpose, and only one, and it has been attained in in- 
finite perfection. Man was to be convinced of his lost 
and ruined condition, of the necessity of a Saviour, and 
also of the existence of such a Saviour, and the means 
by which eternal salvation might be attained through, 
him. This is all that has been attempted, and it is 
gloriously accomplished. Christianity is not a theory; 
not a cold, soulless theology; not a system to tickle 
the philosophical reason; but a life — a grand lifting up 
of mortal man to a glorious immortality, a beginning 
on earth of an existence which shall never end. It is 
not intended merely for the wise, for the educated, for 
the refined, but for all men of all classes. It reaches, in 
its simplicity, the feeblest mind, and this places man in a 
position where he may — 



352 JOHJ!^ PACKER MITCHELL. 



flourish in immortal youth, 



Unhurt amidst the war of elements, 

The wreck of matter and the crush of worlds." 

Then let us to work and not speculate. We have no 
time to spare upon an eifort to comprehend the causes 
and reasons which sway the mind of God, while the 
world is perishing round us for a simple knowledge of 
the glad tidings first announced, when an angePs voice 
declared, "Behold, I bring you glad tidings of great 
joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born 
this day, in the city of David, a Saviour ^ which is Christ 
THE Lord." That we, brethren, may all continue faith- 
ful in our solemn profession before God and men, and 
have power for every duty which devolves upon us as 
laborers in our Lord^s vineyard, and go over eventually 
into the better and everlasting kingdom, is my prayer. 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 353 



SERMON PREACHED AT BEAVER CREEK, MD. 

[Sunday, March 9, 1873.] 

"Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things 
are passed aAvay; behold, all things are become new." — 2 Cor. v. 17. 

There is, no doubt, miicli misconception, even in pro- 
fessedly Christian communities, as to what it is to be a 
genuine Christian. Many indications lead us to the con- 
clusion that multitudes of people look upon Christianity 
as a system which has forms and ceremonies, which of 
themselves will exercise some magical influence upon 
men, and save them because they have taken membership 
in the Christian society. The sentiment seems to be that 
when one attends to certain prescribed rites, a sort of 
spiritual mark is put upon him which distinguishes him 
in the sight of God from those w^ho have not attended to 
such rites. Christianity is a sort of freemasonry, and a 
man joins the church as he would join himself to any hu- 
man party. He stands one day a sinner among sinners. 
He makes up his mind that he has but a short time to 
stay in this w^orld, and reflects that membership in the 
Church of Christ may be a sort of life-boat which will 
securely ride the rough billows which will roll around 
him in the hour of death, when his own vessel shall have 
been overwhelmed. He has no other intention than that of^ 
securing a forlorn hope w^iich may serve him when he 
can no longer serve himself He makes up his mind to 
'^join the church.'^ He inquires as to the forms to which 
he shall have to submit ; learns what will be required of 
him; renders a ceremonial obedience to what is taught 
30 



354 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

him, and without any change whatever in his motives, his 
purposes, his affections or desires, he considers himself 
marked for eternal life, because he is a recognized mem- 
ber of the church. No greater mistake was ever com- 
mitted by mortal man. Christianity is intended to make 
men new creatures, for as the apostle says : " Neither cir- 
cumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but a 
new creature" (Gal. vi. 15); and if any man be in Christ 
he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, 
all things are become new. Like nearly every thing else 
connected with man's life, there are two extremes on this 
subject, and in this, as in nearly all cases, the truth lies 
between them. Some conclude, because the forms of 
Christianity are of no account without the heart is 
changed and renewed, that, therefore, nothing more is 
necessary than this change of heart, and that forms are 
non-essential ; others, who would like to indulge, unre- 
strained, the desires of the flesh, and yet secure the joys 
of heaven, conclude that if they submit to forms pre- 
scribed by authority of the church, such submission will 
be the means of their salvation. Both of these are ex- 
tremes, and both are equally dangerous. 

We might well draw an illustration from the case of 
a man who is physically sick — for the sickness of the 
soul, called sin, has many striking analogies to disease of 
the body. When a man is sick the vital organs still act, 
but their action is abnormal. The heart still throbs, but 
its action, being too slow, produces a chill, or being too 
violent produces fever. A sinner is using his faculties; 
but he is using them abnormally, and in a way they are 
not intended to be used. W^e imagine a man who has 
lost all appetite for food, who is reduced to the last ex- 
tremity, but who can take no nourishment for want of an 
appetite. Now it could be possible, perhaps, to gain his 



« 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 355 

consent, that food should be forced down his throat by 
his friends who were strong in health ; but scarcely any 
one would suspect his lost strength would be restored in 
that way. He might be forced through a form of eating 
without deriving any advantage whatever through such a 
process. But now, by careful nursing, by cheerful con- 
versation, by the use of proper sanitary remedies, the 
patient may begin to feel a craving for food. Now imag- 
ine his nurse saying to him : " You need not go through 
a form of eating, you have the far more important inner 
change, and the whole external process is of no account 
when the inner man is right. If you are not right within, 
you are not in a condition to take food; and if you are 
right within, food is not needed.^^ How plain to every 
one it is that the appetite is necessary ; but how plain, too, 
that the mere forms, connected with eating and sound 
health, are necessary too. 

True it is, there must be an inner change in the sinner 
that he may become the child of God. To go through any 
form without this change would be a useless mockery ; 
but when one does hunger and thirst after the things of 
the kingdom of God, when the whole heart loathes the 
things of sin and yearns for the things of righteousness, 
how important, how indispensable are forms of action 
that one may know what movement to make w^hen he is 
impelled to flee away from sin and secure eternal rest! 
We can conceive no idea of what these forms ought to be, 
for the process of redemption is understood fully by none 
but God ; therefore we should listen while God prescribes 
the forms, and, without any deviation, obey his command- 
ments. Both inner change and external form are neces- 
sary, and to our view one is just as necessary as the other; 
because God offers no hope to any one without both. 
Love for God, and abhorrence for all he abhors, prompts 



356 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

us to obey him, and the same love prompts to do, with- 
out question, whatever he has commanded us to do. 

But it must be plain to every one that the formalities 
of our religion can only be valuable as they furnish 
means whereby one may perform service to God, which a 
changed heart prompts him to perform. They can never 
become a sort of pass-word, or countersign, the possession 
of which shall entitle one to say to the angels who are to 
separate wheat and tares — " I have been recognized as a 
member of the church; I have submitted to the rules; I 
have been careful to attend meetings on the Lord^s day ; I 
am marked for eternal life.^^ Dear brethren ! the church 
on earth can read actions only ; but the great Judge, who 
shall separate the evil from the good, is a discerner of 
the thoughts and intents of the heart. 

I have dwelt on this subject somewhat at length, be- 
cause my text leads me to speak of constant, ceaseless 
effort on the part of those who would be prepared to meet 
Christ at his coming. I want to assail, and, if possible, 
destroy the idea which is too common with many, that 
our life is a sort of double life — that the Christianas life is, 
indeed, of necessity, a double life; that he is something 
on Sunday which he is not and can not be on any other 
day of the week ; that he is, and must be a better man at 
the communion table than he is on ordinary occasions. 
All thoughts of this kind arise from an impression, alas ! 
too general, that the church is a society which, as a so- 
ciety, is going to save us as though it were a sort of spirit- 
ual mutual insurance company, and that membership in it 
gives one a policy awarding him an eternal habitation 
when this tabernacle shall have been dissolved. Oh ! I 
fe'ar there will be loud and dreadful wailings when the 
generations of men form one countless congregation in 
the great and terrible day of the Lord. For all the vast 



I 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 357 

host that shall appear at the judgment-seat must account, 
as individuals, for the deeds done in the body, and none 
can offer assistance to any other. If we turn to the first 
recorded instance where human beings were added to the 
church, we find that they were added after receiving re- 
mission of sins, or in the very moment of receiving re- 
mission, and that the church is made up of those whose 
sins, through obedience to Jesus Christ, have been blotted 
out. Each individual is supposed to be one who proposes, 
in all things, to obey Christ, and so the church does not 
make Christians, but Christians make the church. We 
are gathered into a society of which the Lord Jesus is the 
head, and each individual has duties to perform for the 
whole of the society as well as for himself. But with 
each individual of us, it is all an individual affair. We 
shall each be called upon for our own account and for the 
account of no other. No society will save us, nor will 
we save any society; as each one of us sows we shall also 
reap. First — What is it to be in Christ? Secondly — What 
to be a new creature? 

That no misunderstanding of the important truth I 
would enforce may arise in the mind of any here, I 
will illustrate by tracing the scriptural process of mak- 
ing out of a sinner a child of God. The truth as it is 
in Christ reaches the heart of a sinner, and the only way 
through which any human heart has ever been reached 
is through the teaching of the word of God. Whatever 
other means God may have to cooperate with the word, 
are understood by himself only. The only part of the 
work practical to men is, that the truths contained in the 
Bible concerning Jesus shall be imparted to the human 
mind. Now, when any fact is in the human mind, 
which that mind conceives to be of great importance, 
it does not lie dead, like an image stamped upon a 



'358 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

steel plate, but the mind uses it, and works upon it 
as the stomach works upon food. The truth of the 
gospel of Jesus Christ comes to the human mind as 
facts in regard to the most vital interests of humanity. 
It deals with sin, righteousness and judgment. It points 
out the sinfulness of men, and their consequent aliena- 
tion from God; the righteousness of Jesus Christ — a 
man approved of God — and his consequent ability to 
save sinners ; and a final judgment, when God will 
enter into strict account with his creature man for all 
the deeds done in the body. A past life of sin is be- 
hind us, from which, of ourselves, we can not escape; 
an awful judgment is before us, Avhich is as certain as 
death itself, and those sins of which we are already 
guilty are sufficient for our condemnation, if we should 
sin no more forever. What mind, which has appre- 
hended these fearful truths, will fail to ponder on them, 
and often return to ponder on them again? And what 
heart of man but will sink in despair, and cry out, " Oh ! 
wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me?'' But 
oh! thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord, the cen- 
tral truth is borne in upon the heart, the lovely image 
of the Son of God, whose righteousness has triumphed 
over sin and death, and who is mighty with all the 
power of the Father to save from sin; and strong with 
all the strength of the conqueror of death to deliver 
us from the terrors of the coming judgment. The same 
Scripture which points out our lost and miserable con- 
dition, fills us w4th wonder and love, that one who was 
rich with all the possessions of all that belonged to God, 
should take upon him the poverty of the most lowly 
man, that he might rescue us from sin and bestow upon 
us the privileges of the children of God. The gospel 
is not a story to appall the mind with the revelation of 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 359 

the hideous nature of sin, and then leave the sinner in 
hopeless despair on account of the certainty of a fear- 
ful judgment to come; but also, and more particularly, 
to win the deepest affections of the human heart by the 
divine loveliness of the Lord Jesus. 

One is impelled by fear and horror to escape from 
sin and its consequences in the coming judgment, and 
is led to lay hold on the blessed Saviour by all that 
is lovely and interesting in a man whose every human 
characteristic is as perfect as the perfections of God. 
When the mind turns with horror and loathing from 
sin, and the heart reaches with earnest yearnings toward 
Christ, that is a change of heart; and the only sort of 
change which is required that one may be a Christian, 
and without which no one ever became a Christian. 
He is now in a condition corresponding to the sick man 
who has an appetite for food. He longs to begin the 
work of being a Christian, and seeks to know what he 
ought to do. His desire is to be recognized by the 
Saviour as a follower and a brother; his heart yearns 
for an assurance of the pardon of his sins, and of ac- 
ceptance with God. He desires greatly to be in Christ. 
That the believer must repent and commence the liv- 
ing of a godly life, is undisputed. That he must be 
baptized in order to the remission of sins, is disputed 
by a great many. Jesus mentions baptism in the last 
commission ; it is commanded by Peter the first time 
men were added to the church ; it is set forth by many 
special instances of conversion given as in Luke's narra- 
tive of the Acts of Apostles; it is mentioned again and 
again in the most important connections in the letters 
W'ritten to the Romans, to the Corinthians, to the Colos- 
sians and to others ; and is even spoken of as the act 
by which one comes into the saved relation which the 



360 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

disciples of Christ enjoy and hold in reference to their 
Master — Christ the Anointed of the Father : " For as 
many of you as have been baptized into Christ have 
put on Christ/^ 

The argument of those who would make baptism of 
little consequence, is, that it is a mere external act, and 
can not change the heart or purify the conscience. This 
may be true, since it is nowhere represented as doing 
either of these things in the Scriptures ; but nothing 
could be devised as a more searching test, whether the 
heart is changed, or whether the conscience is purified. 
It is not merely a change of heart that makes one a 
Christian; but a change of life — a new creature. Sup- 
pose that a sick man has implicit confidence in his 
physician. He will not show his confidence by examin- 
ing each item of his prescription, and use such only as 
he deems valuable, and reject such as he judges to be 
of no account. Imagine an invalid, who has found it 
necessary to call in a widely celebrated physician, look- 
ing carefully over the medicine, and saying : " Yes, 
this ingredient is good. My mother used to employ it 
in like cases. It will afPect the action of the heart, 
and I knoAV the functions of my heart are sadly de- 
ranged. I need that. I will take it; nothing ails my 
skin. I will have the druggist omit that item when he 
makes up the prescription.^^ Is that man trusting the 
doctor, or is he trusting his own skill? If he should 
die for want of the very item he has omitted, Avill it 
be the fault of the physician or his own fault? The 
very reason why a sick man wants a doctor, is because 
he has not the skill to prescribe for himself, or else 
the sickness deprives him of the power to use his own 
skill. The moment a physician is consulted, there is 
an implied understanding that the patient will repose 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 361 

confidence in him and do what he directs. So in the 
dreadful disease of sin — the leprosy of the soul — all 
human skill is baffled, and all hope of cure is in the 
Great Physician, the Lord Jesus Christ. Will the sin- 
ner, at the very beginning of the cure, which will 
require a life-time, dare set up his fallible judgment, 
and say: "Faith is all right, it lays hold on divine 
help and purifies the heart; repentance is important, it 
changes the life ; but, as for baptism, it is a mere 
external act — a mere cleansing of the flesh — and I will 
run the risk without it.'^ The man who boasts so 
loudly of his radical change of heart, and sets up this 
change as sufficient for his escape from sin without 
baptism, gives the highest proof that can be given of 
a negative — that he has no change of heart at all. He 
says, by actions loader than any words can be, " I 
w^ill be a man of faith as far as my own wisdom ap- 
proves what is commanded;'^ and in that very resolu- 
tion proves that he is not a man of faith at all. I 
have been much impressed of late with the vast im- 
portance of our having just such an institution as bap- 
tism, to stand just where baptism is put by our Lord 
Jesus Christ, when he says : " He that believeth and is 
baptized shall be saved ;^^ and just where Peter puts it, 
when he says: "Repent, and be baptized in the name 
of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and you shall 
receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.^^ There is a great 
deal of movement in the minds of all who are thinkers 
in the Protestant world. There is a strong desire and 
tendency to get away from all the devices of men, and 
find the divine standard ; but having rejected baptism as 
the specific act in which we are met by the pardoning 
love of God, they are utterly at a loss for something to 
quiet the conscience, and to give the longing sinner posi- 
31 



362 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

tive assurance that he is accepted of God. In a late 
issue of the Christian Union there is a striking illustra- 
tion of what I mean. Some one asks, in evident dis- 
tress, what to do to get an emotional love for Christ. 
He is answered very properly, "that in place of mor- 
bidly looking into the heart to see whether it loves or 
not, it is better to translate that love into actions;'^ but 
fails to point out any act which the inquirer may per- 
form, after which he may have God^s assurance that his 
sins are forgiven — that he needs only to be faithful that 
he may receive a crown of life that shall not fade. A 
bias has followed many men, caused by their early train- 
ing, so that they fail entirely to tell sinners w^hat to do 
to be saved, and yet claim to be embassadors of Jesus 
Christ. 

Water is put, in a very small quantity, on the face 
of little babes, and that is called baptism ; then, when 
these persons are old enough to cry out, "What must I 
do?^^ the answer of a good conscience they can not 
find in baptism, thinking they were baptized before 
they could have either the answer of a good or a bad 
conscience. When a man obeys God in an action which 
his judgement approves, he does w^ell, not because he 
follows his judgment, but because he obeys God. But 
when one does what God commands, though his judg- 
ment perceives no fitness in it, he gives a high proof 
that his faith in the Saviour is the motive power of his 
life. 

But now, being baptized, having given his heart to 
Christ, the real work begins of his transformation into 
the very image of the Lord. 

And here we just properly reach the text which has 
been read. I ask you to read with care the chapter in 
which this Scripture occurs, and the two which follow; 



SEBMONS AND ADDRESSES. 363 

and if our lives are spared to meet here again in two 
weeks from to-day, we shall resume the consideration 
of the question, what it is to be in the image of Christ. 

But are there none here now who will give us the 
hand in token of their willingness to unite with us in 
an earnest effort to live a ^^ life hid with Christ in 
God ? " I need not remind you by what a frail tenure 
your mortal lives are held. The mournful processions 
which have so often, during the last winter, gathered 
about the open graves in all the grave-yards of this 
neighborhood, the sad faces that have been wet with 
recent teai^ for the loss of loved ones, which are seen 
all around us, speak in stronger terms than I can use, 
telling us that all humanity is one vast funeral pro- 
cession, and that we are all marching onward to find 
our own graves. God offers eternal life, and this life 
Ls in his Son. To be in Christ is to be free from 
sin and secure against death. The mighty struggle of 
Jesus has made salvation easy, and all may enjoy it 
who will obey him. You may reject these terms and 
go on in the paths you are now treading, but when you 
gtand before God in the judgment, you will wonder that 
so much was done for vou, and blame none but vour- 
selves that the eternal inheritance is not for you. 

AYe invite those who have never obeyed the Saviour 
to obey him now; and if there are those here who 
ought to be, and are not, identified with a congrega- 
tion of the Disciples of Christ, we invite them to come 
forward while a hymn is sung, and unite with us in our 
efforts to follow the Saviour of the world. 



364 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



THE OLD WAY. 

" Thus saith the Lord, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the 
old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find 
rest for your souls." — Jer. vi. 16. 

If a clock commence losing a second every day, and its 
owner should be careful to keep it running, at the end of 
a year it would be six minutes out of the way, and hav- 
ing answered all the purposes of a clock for a w^hole 
year, and having had so slight a variation, that those, 
who from day to day depended upon it, had not discov- 
ered that it was wTong, it would become a noted clock 
throughout the community where it was, and a sort of 
regulator for all the time-pieces round about; but at the 
end of two years it would be twelve minutes wrong, and 
in a few^ years it would be worse than no clock at all. 
Now suppose when it has lost an hour, an astronomer 
happens that way, and by the most careful calculations, 
based upon the true standards of time, the sun and stars, 
he assures the people w^ho have had the clock so long for 
a standard, that it has gone an hour wrong, and desires 
to put it right again. How foolish it would be for them 
to say, No, sir, we will submit to no innovation, we want 
no new time, Ave are going to stick to the old time-piece 
which has beeji running twelve years, and never once has 
stopped. For twelve years we have risen in the morning 
and retired at night by that clock, our meals have been 
regulated by it, many who sleep in their graves have 
trusted it, and we will allow no man to say it is wrong, 



SERiMONS AND ADDRESSES. 365 

much less to change it. "We think that all would easily 
see that the change sought to be made by the astronomer 
was not the introduction of something new, but a resto- 
ration of what is old. There is a striking illustration of 
the idea we wish to make plain, in the history of our cal- 
endar. What is meant by the calendar, is that orderly 
arrangement of time into years, months, days, hours, etc. 
In the time of Julius Csesar, a little while before Christ 
was born, a system was devised and put into operation 
which is called the Julian calendar. It had, however, a 
minute error in it which, in the course of centuries, had 
rolled up into eleven whole days ; that is the first day of 
April was eleven days from where it was in the time of 
Ctesar when the Julian calendar was made, and, of course, 
every day of the year was just as far wTong. About a 
century ago we adopted a change which had been made 
in Catholic countries a century before correcting the mis- 
take of the eleven days, starting upon a system which 
will prevent the like mistake from occurring again. 
Russia refused to adopt what she called an innovation, 
and continued on in the error, though she is twelve days 
from where she was in the days of Julius Caesar. She 
calls her course of action adhering to the Julian calendar. 
Time works changes so gradually and imperceptibly, 
that it becomes of the highest necessity for us to secure 
some fixed and unchanging standard against which time 
may not operate in every thing where it is important we 
shall hold a fixed and unwavering position. For ordi- 
nary purposes it will answer if we keep a clock or watch 
running with the sun, but when exact accuracy becomes 
essential, the brightest luminary in the sky must not be 
allowed to deceive us by its brightness ; but the far dis- 
tant stars are made the standard, and looking in your al- 
manacs you find a column of figures which indicate how 



366 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

much the sun is slow or fast. But if you have a meridian 
line, or what is called a sun-mark, and your clock is con- 
stantly set by that mark ; if I come to you with star time 
do not say, I have something new, for what I have is the 
oldest, even as old as the time when God first set the 
stars in heaven. 

To us who measure our lives by a few brief years, it is 
a long, long time since the star of Bethlehem shed its 
rays upon the plains of Palestine. It is eighteen hundred 
years since the church of our Lord Jesus Christ was set 
up under the inspired teaching of men whom God had 
chosen for the work. Since these men fell asleep, there 
has not risen another who could lawfully claim to teach 
as they did without possibility of error. If they had 
gone away from earth, leaving their teaching only in the 
minds and hearts of men, to be handed down by tradi- 
tion from age to age, there would have been no standard 
in existence fixed and unwavering by which we might cor- 
rect our errors, and make sure that we were following 
Jesus in his suffering but triumphant pathway through 
sorrow", sin, and the grave to the glories of the eternal 
world. But our loving heavenly Father, who had given 
his Son to die for us, knew all the difficulties of our 
situation, and caused those men, chosen by the Saviour, 
not only to speak the words of life to their own genera- 
tion, but to record them in such shape that, to the remot- 
est ages, the world have a standard by which to guide 
their religious lives as fixed and unwavering as the throne 
of heaven. Yes, the sun shall cease to shine, the sun go 
down to rise no more; but the word of the Lord endur- 
eth forever. Oh ! ever blessed word of my God, how 
wonderful thou art, and how little appreciated even by 
those who profess to love thee ! There is no book in ex- 
istence so wonderful as the Bible, in whatever view we 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 367 

may look npon it, or from whatever standpoint that view 
may be taken, if it be, as we hold it is, the book of God. 
Then it is wonderful that we may be so often, so lovingly, 
and tenderly spoken to in our own language by an Un- 
seen, Immaterial, Eternal, Almighty Being, w^lio created 
heaven and earth, and who sustained, by the word of his 
power, all that his hand had formed. If it be the book 
of man, then it is the wonder of all wonders that men 
should have produced the sublimity, the perfection, and 
truth which have illuminated the dark places of earth 
like the very countenance of God. Dear Christian 
friends ! do we appreciate, as we should, that wonderful 
production, which we have in all our houses, and which 
we know^ as the IS^ew Testament? If we had it not, it 
might be that we would be bowing down to graven im- 
ages which our own hands had made to represent to us 
evil principles we sought to propitiate, and to which, in 
our agony and helplessness, we would offer our children 
who cling to us for our protection and love. Our lives 
would be but histories of lust and sin; our women w^ould 
be but slaves ; our graves dark and gloomy chambers of 
rottenness and worms ; and our death but an entrance into 
an unknown and awful region, and unspeakable gloom 
and desolation. But little as this book has been appre- 
ciated and studied, it has broken idols in pieces, made 
lust a monster to be loathed and shunned, smitten sin 
with a deadly plague, illuminated the darkest corners of 
the grave, and made death a scene of triumph. It is com- 
passed within a volume wdth fewer words than are con- 
tained in a novel which a woman can read through in a 
week and attend to her household affairs. Yet it has a 
perfect history of events which brought God from heaven 
to earth, and elevated man to heaven. It tells us of God 
upon a cross in the person of Jesus, and man on God's 



368 JOHN PACKER IHTCHELL. 

throne in the same glorified person. It tells us how to 
become his subjects and receive his Spirit^ how to live in 
the most minute particulars, and how to die ; and then it 
exhausts all human thought to tell us of the far more 
great and exceeding weight of glory to fall on the chil- 
dren of men when they shall be crowned forever in 
heaven. Ko honest man can read the New Testament, 
study its precepts, and observe its code of morals with- 
out the admission, that if men would receive all and 
practice all, there would be no crime and none of the in- 
numerable sorrows which crime carries in its train. Go 
into the library of some lawyer who has furnished his 
shelves with the volumes which man's wisdom has deemed 
necessary even for the little sphere in w^liich human gov- 
ernment holds sway. Put the New Testament by the 
sides of the tons of books of men, and with the knowl- 
edge of the fact that the little book, if received, believed, 
and obeyed truly, not only renders all those books un- 
necessary and superfluous, but when they stop at the 
grave, it goes on, and on, and on forever, covering, by its 
truths, the existence of man for all eternity. Do this, and 
then say if you can that a few Jews invented that little 
book at a time when the great Koman Empire tow- 
wered up to the skies in pomp of human glory, casting a 
baleful shadow of heathenism, blood, and sin over the 
whole earth. Thanks be to God, for the love which 
moved him to give up his Son for us when w^e were yet 
sinners, and may we not forget that Jesus is the begin- 
ning, middle, and end of the revelation of God ; but let us 
never cease to return him thanks that he fixed for us a 
perfect standard by which we continually rectify and an- 
tidote the slow but fatal innovations if time. 

Eighteen centuries ago, there was a church in the 
world which had just begun to exist, and the laws for its 



SEBMOXS AjSD ADDRESSES. 369 

organization and government, and for the regulation of 
the lives of all its members, came from the mouths of 
men who gpake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost ; 
could these men have lived always in this world, as long 
as time shall last, their presence could not answer the end 
for which they were chosen ; for they could not be every- 
where at all times; and there were constantly recurring 
questions and difficulties coming up for answers and ad- 
justment from every place where the gospel found a lodg- 
ment. Paul felt this great tax upon him, even in the in- 
fancy of the church, and spoke of the grievous care of all 
the churches which came upon him. But Jesus had truly 
come in the fullness of time ; a most wonderful language 
had been built up and perfected, and was known all over 
the world, in which could be set forth the great truths 
which are the heart of Christianity, and the rules by 
which persons are to enter into the church, and how to 
behave when in it. Within fifty years next succeeding the 
setting up of the church, there was a book of God as well 
as the church of God in the world. Soon after the book 
was finished, the last one of these inspired writers fell 
asleep, leaving these two things in the world. The Greek 
language, in which the New Testament was w^ritten, pet- 
rified, as it were, holding the truths of God fixed and 
unchangeable forever. It ceased shortly after to be a 
spoken language, and hence prevented a possibility of 
change in the statements of truth contained in it by the 
gradual innovations of time. Thus we had fixed for us 
to govern and preserve the church a divine standard, as 
the changeless stars correct and keep in order the chro- 
nology of the world. Let us keep this in mind while we 
briefly glance at the history of the church which went 
forth to do battle against the most hideous of the most 
corrupt age the world ever saw. There is an absolute 



370 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

standard — a perfect standard — whicli may be consulted, but 
men may go on in their own way without consulting it, 
just as a man may carry a watch in his pocket until it 
gets several hours wrong, when he might adjust it if he 
would. 

Between the history given us of the church in the 
New Testament by the Holy Spirit, and that given by 
uninspired writers, there is a clearly marked line. The 
obscurity of Christianity for a century after its first es- 
tablishment, prevented any, except the slightest notice 
of it from the heathen world in the shape of history. 
Therefore, we lose sight of its progress, either in truth 
or in error, for a considerable period ; and when it again 
emerges into view, we find a number of slight differences 
between it and the church sketched in the Scriptures. 
We can easily see how those who were in the church 
might fail to recognize any change in doctrine or 
practice, for, as yet, the changes were very slight; but in 
the second century we find the germs of Popery, of 
monkery, of the worship of Mary, of the doctrine con- 
cerning purgatory, of infant baptism, and a number of 
other things not found in the sacred writings of the 
evangelists and apostles of the Lord Jesus. The church, 
as a society, was undergoing those changes which time 
will always produce, when truth is sought to be handed 
from age to age by tradition. It seems to have been 
necessary that men should learn by experience, and that, 
too, of the hardest kind; that no human implement 
should be lifted up to construct material for the church 
of Jesus Christ; that all was perfected when the last 
apostle rested from his labors. It is not necessary that 
I should trace the history of the church from the time 
when those gradual innovations had wrought such changes, 
that the institution claiming to be the church had 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 371 

scarcely a recognizable resemblance to the church of 
New Testament times. The standard of righteousness — 
the word of God — was taken away from a deluded peo- 
ple, and was to be consulted by a comparatively few 
only. When one of these raised his voice in favor of the 
old standard, he was put to death, or, at least, silenced, 
and there rose up a monstrous form, sitting in the place 
of God, and showing himself that he is God. 

In the sixteenth century a number of causes combined 
to free the human mind from the thralldom in which it 
had long been held by the Roman Catholic Church, and 
prominent among them, an array of great and godly 
men, with Martin Luther as their acknowledged leader. 
The book of God was given to the people in their own 
language, and, as printing was opportunely invented at 
the very time when it was needed to circulate the Bible, 
it soon became easy for those who wished to consult the 
writings of inspired men. The great w^ork of the six- 
teenth century was to give the people the Bible, but the 
departures from primitive faith and practice Avas too 
great to admit of an immediate return, in all partic- 
ulars, to the old standard. There was an attempted 
reformation of the long corrupted church, which was 
so fir successful as to be very justly considered one 
of the most important epochs of the world's history, 
and to receive the name of the great reformation. But 
it was only a reformation. In dealing w^ith the fear- 
ful and numerous abuses which fifteen hundred years 
of traditionary^ teaching had fastened upon the church, 
an effort was made to avoid shocking the long preju- 
diced minds of men any more than was absolutely 
necessary. 

If a clock had been gaining time so long that a whole 
day had been gained, it would startle its owner very 



372 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

greatly to be informed, upon a consultation of the true 
standard, that the day he kept for Sunday was not Sun- 
day, and that he was w^orking every Lord's day of his 
life. So to correct merely the abuses of so long a growth 
would almost leave an impression upon the people that 
they had no church at all. It became, therefore, a 
principle of the reformation to retain in the reformed 
church any thing apparently innocent in itself, which 
was not expressly forbidden by the word of God; and 
thus a good many things were retained which had no 
higher warrant than tradition, because they were sup- 
posed to be innocent, and some of them not only inno- 
cent, but useful, while other things, having the very 
same authority, were rejected. That a mighty reforma- 
tion was effected is, undoubtedly, true, but a complete 
return to apostolic teaching and j)ractice was not at- 
tempted, and, of course, was not effected. But the God- 
given standard was restored to men in giving them the 
Bible, and the inevitable consequence was, a constantly 
increasing effort to rectify what was found to be wrong. 
But the principle introduced in the beginning of the 
reformation, of admitting what had become dear to good 
men's hearts by long established usage, began to clog 
the reformation itself by making a new starting point at 
the beginning of Protestantism. Protestant traditions 
commenced growing, and became a new source of diffi- 
culty and danger. It w^as a great" mistake, when a Di- 
vine standard was at hand, not to rightly conform every 
thing to it. Considering the circumstances, it is not a 
matter of surprise that the mistake was made then, but 
it is surprising that it is still clung to now. In order 
that all may understand what is meant, we will cite an 
example of the working of this rule. The doctrine of 
celibacy — that is, that it is good for man to be alone and 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES 373 

not to marry — is just as old as infant baptism ; but the 
reformers considered the former a bad principle, and, 
consequently, rejecting it, they allowed the preachers to 
marry wives like other Christian men ; while they con- 
sidered the latter a good thing, and consequently retained 
it, yet the authority for one is precisely the same as for 
the other. 

In the first quarter of the present century, there be- 
gan a religious movement, not for reformation simply, 
but for the complete restoration of primitive Christianity, 
a great principle was enunciated as the key-note of the 
movement. ^^ Where the Scriptures speak we speak, 
where they are silent we are silent.'^ A man eminent 
for piety, and for twenty years a preacher in the Presby- 
terian church, inaugurated this movement, Avhich was, 
soon after its enunciation, urged with great vigor by his 
able and pious son, Alexander Campbell, then of Buffalo, 
Brooke County, Virginia. These men were soon joined 
by a number of other pious, godly and able men, who 
became co-operants with the Campbells in the noble 
efforts to restore primitive Christianity, in "letter and in 
spirit, in faith and in practice." We have no disposi- 
tion to compare these men in any way with any body, 
though we respect them highly and love their memories; 
all the merits for which we plead are in the truths 
which they enunciated. If it is right to speak only 
w^hen, and as the Scriptures speak in religious mat- 
ters, and to be silent where they are silent, then it is 
right if the Campbells had not been great and good 
men. 

It is proposed to set things in the same order in which 
they were in the time of the apostles, not by tracing 
present practices back through eighteen hundred years 
of traditions, and discovering where and how they got 



374 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



wrong; but by at once consulting the apostles them- 
selves, and putting all just as they had it. When this 
is done all that is right in all churches will remain, and 
all that is wrong will be got rid of in a single effort. 
Dear friends, the question is not whether the Campbells 
and their compeers were greater and better men than 
others since the days of the apostles, nor whether those 
who call themselves simply disciples of Christ are wiser 
and better people than other believers in Jesus Christ. 
If these were the questions, I feel that I would be the 
last man to present them for consideration. 

If I felt that I must assume that I am the wisest and 
best preacher in this county, because I am the only one 
who preaches what I am preaching, I am very confident 
I should and would not be here. W-e invite you to no 
such comparisons. AVe ask you,^s the principle right f 
Is it right f Is it right to correct a clock by a perfect 
standard? Is it not right to do what is commanded by 
Christ^s authority, and to leave out of his church what- 
ever his authority does not warrant? If this is a correct 
principle, which we undoubtingly believe it is, in all 
confidence and in all respect, we urge all men to receive 
it and conform their practice to it. Then if you find 
some things which have been dear to you, and which 
were dear to your parents when they died, slipping away 
from you, let no regrets go with them if they have no 
warrant in the word of God. If you find something yet 
to do, when you have long been impressed with the 
thought that you have done all, oh, for the love of Jesus 
Christ ! do it. If it is in the word of God, cast no unkind 
reflections upon any who go not with you, but let no 
sacredness of old associations, and no fear of present 
denunciations or contempt, keep you from conforming 
your own life to the standard of the word of God. Feel 



SERMONS AXD ADDRESSES, 375 

that you are to enter into judgment for yourself alono. 
Remember that no man can save or damn you. Look 
upon yourself as though you were the only individual 
upon the earth, and, as such, conform your own life to 
the teaching of the Bible. Then, if you find yourself 
stajiding where I stand, call me brother, and take me by 
the hand. 

It is no new thing we ask men to receive, but to many 
it seems new, because that which is really new is the 
oldest known to them. 

If I wanted to regulate your clock by the old, old 
stars, which have held on their changeless path while 
millions of time-keepers have gone wrong, you would 
feel your folly if you should charge me with offering you 
something new while you refuse to receive it. So when 
we ask only that all shall do what God's word com- 
mands, and drop out of the church all that is not found 
in that word ; whether you go wdth us or not, do not seek 
an excuse for yourself in the fallacy that the very oldest 
that can be called gospel is new. 



'^76 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 



THE OBEDIENT HAVE THE PKOMISE OF 
ETEENAL SALVATION. 

"And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation 
to all them that obey him. " — Heb. v. 9. 

Whatever a study of the past history of the human 
family may unfold, as the reasons for any thing existing 
among us now, may be satisfactory to the seeker after 
truth, but can not in any way affect our condition for 
good or evil. There are none of us that are not bound 
to confess, when we make an examination of all our 
surroundings, that we are in a most terrible extremity, 
if some power, infinitely greater than any we possess, is 
not employed for our benefit. The one great longing of 
our nature is for life; and when we look upon all the 
forces humanity can wield, and gather them up for an 
effort to conquer the grim and awful destiny which, with 
iron grasp, is dragging us hourly nearer to the grave, 
we find that in every one of these forces we can see the 
hand of death, but not one gleam of hope that we may 
enjoy a longer and better life than that we now possess. 
"When we lay hold of those stupendous powers which 
man has gathered up from the great fields of nature, and 
think to employ them for our escape from bondage under 
death, we feel that they may turn against us, and hurry 
us to our doom, but can not be used to turn aside, for a 
single moment, the impending fate. Shall we use that 
great power, now employed to force great vessels through 
and over the great and trackless deep, or immense cars 
over the mountains, vales and streams which lie across 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 377 

a continent? If we gaze awhile upon the busy throng, 
which all around the world is using the power of steam^ 
we shall see vessels hurled in fragments through the air, 
and human beings torn to atoms, under the explosive 
power of this force, and whole trains of cars with hun- 
dreds of passengers, disappear in one common heap of 
indistinguishable ruin. And so of all the natural forces 
which man employs — earth, air, fire and water, essential 
as they all are to our well-being — all conceal some hidden 
death, ready to rush upon us when we least suspect dan- 
ger, and bring us to the grave. But no voice is heard 
among them offering consolation or hope to the millions 
w^ho weep at the graves of their dead, and shrink with 
inexpressible horror from the same fate themselves. 

We may then safely assume that we are dying beings, 
that we desire life more than we desire any thing else, 
and that we can have no hope of gratifying this desire 
unless some power is employed greater than we can find 
in nature. 

The great works which both heaven and earth present 
to our view, attest to us the fact that there is a power 
vastly greater and higher than all the greatness of the 
physical universe. The Bible informs us that this power 
is a Being, and that this Being is God, clothed with all 
the attributes of infinite perfection. The mere knowledge 
that there is such a being is sufficient to indicate to us 
our own imperfection in contrast with him. We turn 
away from nature in despair of finding any help for our 
own weakness and misery, and are brought into view of 
one who has just what we want — eternal life; and who 
has, in connection with this, complete and unmixed hap- 
piness, and we can not but think that if w^e could in any 
way secure these two things, our existence would leave 
us nothing to desire. But when we think of God, in a 
32 



378 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

moment all hope in this direction is changed into deepest 
despair; for the same volume which informs us of his 
almighty power, and eternal life, and perfect happiness, 
tells us also, that he is all perfect, and that he ^^ will by- 
no means clear the guilty.^^ We flee from the awful 
presence of ^^this blessed and only potentate. King of 
kings and Lord of lords,^^ who only hath immortality 
dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto ; 
feeling alas ! that we are riot only weak and ignorant 
and miserable, but are sinners. We are compelled to 
acknowledge not only our own powerlessness to escape 
from death, but are driven to despair when we find Ave 
are utterly unworthy of help from the only being in the 
universe who can afford it. We are, then, in bondage to 
sin and death, and there can be no hope for us unless we 
can elude those relentless powers who are on our track. 
We are mortal, and have an indescribable longing after 
immortality. We are sinners, and can hope for escape only 
by being freed from sin by the Almighty Being against 
whom we have sinned. 

If we owed a large debt to some party, a third party 
might appear, discharge the obligation for us, and save 
us from financial ruin. But in this case there is only one 
being in all the universe who can do any thing to save 
us. There is no third party who can cay to God, ^^ I will 
discharge the obligation of these sinners, so that you will 
have nothing against them any more, and then you must 
answer that longing of their souls and grant them eter- 
nal life.'^ The identical power against whom we have 
sinned, and between whom and us our sins have digged 
an impassable gulf, is the sole source of hope to us of a 
better life and higher happiness than those which go 
down in awful gloom at the grave. 

Says some poor lost sinner : " Oh, I will cry out in the 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 379 

depth of ray misery, uaiil my cries reach the ear of God, 
and bring him to my rescue/^ But can wailing blot out 
sin? Can cries of despair make good the bad life we 
have left behind us? Can tears wash away guilt, or the 
deepest sorrow of a sinner restore the harmony which has 
been broken in the moral universe of God? "But,^' says 
one, " I will begin now, and I will never sin again so long 
as I live. I will always do what is pleasing in the sight 
of God, and I will win his favor by my goodness." Sup- 
pose that this was possible. Suppose that one could 
commence now and never sin again as long as life lasts, 
how shall the black record of sin, which his past life has 
left, be accounted for? If we devote every moment of 
our future life to the service of God, we give him no more 
than his own, and we can never accumulate a credit to 
cancel the old account; and one unforgiven sin is enough 
to drag us away from the face of that glorious majesty 
in heaven, w^ho is purity itself, and can not consort with 
sin. But this experiment was fully tried Avhen God 
granted to men the privilege of winning his favor and 
securing his help by his own righteousness under the 
law of Moses, which definitely pointed out to those who 
received it what they must refrain from doing, and what 
they must do to be worthy of the favor of God. The 
result of this experiment was to remove man in bis sin 
to a greater distance than ever from the hope of conquer- 
ing by his own righteousness. For the law pointed out 
a perfection which, unaided, man could never attain, and 
said to him, "He that doeth these things shall live by 
them." This is what Paul means by the statement, "The 
law entered, that the offense might abound." Many 
things were found to be sinful and displeasing to God, 
which, before the giving of the law, had not been recog- 
nized as sin at all, and the knowledge came slowly, pain- 



380 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

fully, but with crushing force, that if only those who 
kept the law could live by the sayings of the law, then 
by the deeds of the law there could be no flesh justified. 
When man made the effort" to merit God^s favor, he found 
the law which directed his actions to be a chain of bond- 
age ta him, for there was in his nature a fathomless deep 
of depravity which no mere laAV could break up, and 
when he would do good evil, was present with him. 
"What a wonderful and merciful provision it was which 
connected itself with the law of Moses, whereby sacrifices 
and offerings for sin pointed sinful men forward to the 
great atonement wdiich God had in contemplation ! 

At last the whole earth was in a condition to recognize 
its helplessness before God, and present itself in utter de- 
spair, crying out for unmerited, unpurchasable help from 
heaven. The Gentile world had demonstrated the truth, 
that man^s wisdom could do nothing for his rescue from 
sin and death ; and the history of the Jews showed, with 
equal force, that man's own righteousness was as power- 
less as his wisdom, even when God pointed out in a 
written law what righteousness was. How wretched and 
helpless was man without any knowledge of the living 
and true God, and how greatly was this misery deepened 
to those who had a knowledge of God's attributes and 
of his glorious life and eternal happiness, and felt power- 
less to attain them. 

Who shall ever measure the wondrous love of God ! and 
what man shall ever appreciate the mighty sacrifice which 
he made that he might redeem us from sin, and give us 
life eternal ? There was no third power which might in- 
terfere and make restitution for the guilt of man, and though 
he were willing to take us into his family and make 
us immortal, it could be done only through the blotting 
out of our sins. Then one of that Divine family, before 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 381 

which man stood condemned, took upon him the weak- 
ness of human flesh, and was born into this world of sin, 
in order that he might bear the woes which otherwise 
must plunge humanity into eternal despair. How shall 
we ever know the greatness of the sacrifice that was made 
when the Lord of glory left his seat on high, where, far 
above all sin, and misery, and pain he enjoyed whatever 
belonged to God, and " thought it not robbery to be 
equal with God," to come down into this world of ours, 
which was presided over by the arch-foe of heaven, and 
put himself into such a position that for awhile he should 
suffer untold agony in the grasp of Satan ? What human 
soul shall ever be able to conceive the weight of woe 
which overwhelmed the Son of God when he exclaimed : 
"This is your hour and the power of darkness?" Who 
shall ever comprehend the depths of that love which 
brought him, for whom and by whom all things were 
made, into terrific conflict with the powers of evil, and 
led him to yield his soul and body into their grasp that 
he might "taste death for every man?" JSTo wonder that 
man can see no help in the natural world, and find there 
no hope; and no wonder that all the natural forces of 
which he has gained control by a study of God\s works, 
fail to offer him means of escape from sin and death, 
when it required the humiliation of the Son of God, even 
to a shameful and shocking death, in order that escape 
might be possible. Let no man underrate the magnitude 
of this struggle, in which God's Son went down and was 
held for three gloomy days and nights in the grim grasp 
of death. Our case must indeed be desperate when it re- 
quired such an effort, on the part of God, to pluck us 
from ruin. The world has hope in Christ, and in him 
alone, and without him our heritage is every thing that 
is dreadful and gloomy, and not a ray of light glimmers 



382 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

upon our dismal pathway. The creation of the universe 
from nothing was a work so stupendous, that we stand in 
silent wonder when we contemplate such an exhibition 
of Almighty power. But the redemption of man from 
sin was a harder work for God, for it brought his Son 
through nameless anguish to the cross and the grave, and 
stilled in death the mighty hand which constructed 
heaven and earth. But, blessed be God, the victory was 
achieved, and through it the conqueror became the author 
of eternal salvation to all them that obey him. Let none 
forget that his salvation cost more effort, on the part of 
God, than the creation of all-existing things, and with 
this in mind and heart, there is no danger that one will 
ever feel that forms and ceremonies have saved him. If 
one confesses with his mouth the faith of his heart, that 
Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God — realizes the force of 
the great truth he utters — there can be no possibility of 
his attributing his salvation to any thing feeble flesh can 
do, and will be far from thinking that groans and cries 
and tears can add any thing to the atonement Christ has 
made once for all. 

Yet there is something for man to do, as the teaching of 
the whole New Testament indicates, and the text before 
us expressly says: "He became the author of eternal sal- 
vation to all them that obey him.^' "What does this obe- 
dience consist in? How are we to know our part; and 
knowing it, how are we to perform it? Just here a great 
and dangerous mistake is made by many who want to be 
saved through Jesus Christ. They imagine the obedi- 
ence required under the gospel to be the same in effect as 
that required under the law, and consequently they feel 
that he who does the things he is required to do in the 
gospel shall live by them; whereas, those who obey 
Christ, do not win salvation and eternal life by their own 



SER3fONS AND ADDRESSES. 383 

obedience; but they enjoy these things by and through 
our Lord Jesus Christ. The difference in this respect, be- 
tween the law of Moses and the law of Jesus Christ, is 
just this: the man who should keep the whole law would 
be a perfectly righteous man, and Avould be saved by his 
own righteousness. But it was an utter impossibility that 
any mere human being should thus keep the law, for it 
required love to God and love to men, and no mere ar- 
bitrary effort to conform externally to law could change 
the heart and fill it with love. No one in human form 
but the Lord Jesus did ever keep the law fully, and con- 
sequently by the deeds of the law there can no flesh be 
justified. The stupendous w^ork accomplished by Christ 
brought salvation to men as a free gift, and all who are 
saved, are saved because God is gracious and merciful, 
and not because man is perfect in his righteousness. 

But the whole realm in which salvation is wrought for 
us is an invisible one to mortal eyes, and we can gain no 
knowledge of it excepting as God reveals it to us. When 
we consider the little, comparatively, that man does to 
produce the things necessary to sustain physical life, with 
the many that God does in the same w^ork, man's part 
seems quite insignificant, and yet all that God does for us 
will not profit us at all if we do not perform our little 
part. Who can comprehend the vastness of the labor, 
which, through ages, has been put forth to spread out 
these magnificent valleys, with their limestone founda- 
tions and prolific soil ? The clods of earth, so homely and 
common-place, which receive the seeds the farmer sows, 
have cost an immense amount of wisdom for their pro- 
duction. And then consider the great natural forces 
at work to lift out of the distant ocean into the air 
the millions of tons of water which the thirsty soil de- 
mands that it may be productive, and the causes working 



384 



JOHN PACKER mTCHELL. 



to make the winds blow to waft the clouds to us which 
have been hung up over the sea ; the snows and frosts of 
winter, the heat of summer, the genial spring, the fruitful 
autumn, all are arranged and guided by our Almighty 
Father, and the result is a possibility of our securing the 
necessaries and luxuries of life ! How small our work 
compared with God^s! How truly may we pray, "Give 
us our daily bread,^^ and how consistently may we thank 
God for the bountiful gifts of his hand ! and yet, unless 
our little part is done, all that he does for us will avail 
nothing. We must reach forth and appropriate the bless- 
ings within our reach, or we will get none of them. 

The same rule holds good in the greater work of re- 
demption. God has not spared his own Son, but has 
freely given him up for us all, and through him salva- 
tion is brought near to us. It is the " grace of God that 
bringeth salvation ^^ (Titus ii. 11). But it is not, as many 
have imagined, the grace of God does not accept this 
salvation for us; we must accept for ourselves, else we 
can not enjoy the salvation which God's grace has 
brought to us. A good many persons have been fearful 
lest they might attribute their salvation in any degree 
to their own works, and deny to God the praise of his 
glorious grace, which is due on account of the indescrib- 
able love which moved him to freely bestow eternal life 
upon us. But there need be no trouble in the mind of 
any upon this question. No one who has a proper con- 
ception of the greatness of God can imagine that any 
thing we do can add to the ability of God. We do not 
help him when we accept salvation ; but we help ourselves 
to that which he has provided for us. If I purchase 
goods from a merchant, paying him the value he fixes 
upon them, I confer upon him ability to supply that 
which I have taken from his shelves ; but if I freely give 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 385 

those goods to my child, who skillfully manufactures 
them into wearing apparel, the work of the child's hands, 
though essential to the enjoyment of my gift, puts no 
money into my pocket, and confers upon me no ability to 
supply what I have given in the purchase. There is no 
danger that the child will say, I must not cut, nor sew, 
nor wear these goods, for fear I shall attribute all my en- 
joyments of the gift to my own labor. Suppose that a 
father should thus bestow upon a daughter unmanufac- 
tured goods, who is abundantly able to cut, and fit, and 
sew, and after three months, having never seen her wear 
it, he inquires the reason ; and she tells him she has put 
it safely away, where she may occasionally look at it, and 
think of his kindness and love, for she feared to work it 
up, lest she should forget her obligation to him, and ap- 
propriate all praise to herself. How greatly would his 
feelings be hurt, and how poorly w^ould his kindness be 
returned ! The best expression she can give of her high 
appreciation of the freely extended gift is to receive and 
use it well, doing on her own part whatever is necessary 
to its enjoyment. So every-where in the Scriptures is 
held out the idea that the best way we can express our 
sense of obligation to our God for a favor which no labor 
of our own could have procured, and which no act of ours 
can pay for, is faithfully to receive and carefully appro- 
priate the blessing. God has given to us eternal life, and 
this life is in his Son (John i. 7). But to be saved is an 
individual matter, and each sinner must come to Christ, 
and receive the gift for himself. It is a gift of God, but 
it is in his Son, and we can understand the universal ap- 
plication of this invitation of Jesus, "Come unto me." 
After his victory over the grave, he says : "All poioer is 
given unto me in heaven and on earth ; '^ therefore, he 
asks nothing of us by way of increasing his ability to 
33 



386 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

save us. He has this ability — ^he has all power, and what 
the sinner is to do to answer the invitation. Whosoever 
will, let him take the water of life FREELY. 

It required no revelation of God to man teaching him how 
to use his natural powers to secure the physical blessings 
which infinite wisdom and power had provided for him, 
for all this knowledge lay within the physical creation 
by which he was surrounded,, and of which his physical 
organism w^as part. But salvation from sin has to do 
with that which is invisible, and with much which can 
be learned by faith, under the instruction of God. 
Hence the human family have been left, to a great ex- 
tent, unaided in working out the ways and means by 
Avhich to appropriate the blessings which nature holds out 
for them, while with much care and minuteness God has 
revealed to us how we may receive and appropriate the 
spiritual blessings held for us by our Lord Jesus Christ. 
Man is naturally qualified for the work of perpetuating 
animal life, but he must be taught of God what to do 
that he may have life eternal. In both cases we add 
nothing by our own labors to the power of God, but 
only accept what he has provided for us. 

We think a couple of propositions may here be stated 
which no one will deny, but which many may fail to ap- 
preciate the importance of. Whatever God has done for 
us in the past, is done in infinite perfection; whatever 
remains still for God to do for us, will be done in the 
same perfection. These two propositions being undis- 
puted and indisputable, we need give ourselves no un- 
easiness about the work of the Father, the Son or the 
Holy Spirit, all of whom are engaged in this work, but 
to whom we may very safely trust whatever they have 
to do Avithout any suggestions from us. The vital ques- 
tion with us is, What shall we do that, individually, we 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 387 

may be benefited by the work which these Three have 
done, are doing, and will do? If the result of what has 
been done thus far is, that eternal life is in the Son, and 
the Son says "Come/' though the work may astonish us 
by its greatness, and overwhelm us by its exhibitions of 
the boundless love of God, it is a very plain matter that 
what we need now to know is. How shall one come to 
Him in whom is eternal life? The reply to this question 
is the laio of Christ, and is there a man on earth who 
respects Christ, the Son of God, who dares say that any 
thing he has kindly pointed out for us to do is an 
" empty ceremony ? " There is but one writing on earth 
known to us, which records an answer to this question, 
which may be trusted as an infallible one, and this 
writing is Luke's Acts of Apostles. Here, over and 
over, this question is answered, and each answer is so 
perfectly in harmony with every other, that no careful 
reader can conclude that there is more than one way to 
become a disciple of Christ and an heir of eternal life. 
Commencing with Acts ii., we have a reply to many sin- 
ners who anxiously inquired their duty. Two cases are 
in chapter viii.; one in Acts x.; two in Acts xvi.; one 
in Acts xviii., and one in Acts xix.; and, although cir- 
cumstances differed in these cases, and incidents occurred 
in some which did not occur in others, in all the things 
commanded the first time by Peter, as recorded in Acts 
ii. 38, were carefully and promptly attended to by those 
who obeyed the Saviour. In some cases angels had 
some work to do which they did not do in other cases. 
In some visions occurred Avhicli did not occur in all ; in 
one Christ himself made his appearance and spoke in 
his own voice ; in two there was a wonderful manifesta- 
tion of the Holy Spirit; but in each and all, coming to 
Christ, on the sinner's part, began with faith and ended 



388 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

with baptism. To confuse our minds with what God did 
by sendinc^ angels, or by making revelations in visions, 
or outpourings of the Holy Spirit, or by the appearance 
of the glorified Jesus himself, is altogether a useless 
thing. Whatever God did is right. Whatever he may 
do to the end of time and through all eternity will be 
right; and our study of his revelation will be of little 
use to us if we want to fathom what he does so as to 
help him to do it ; and, becoming confused in our efforts 
to comprehend the infinite workings of God, we fail to 
appreciate and perform the finite things he has com- 
manded. 

Man does not need to be told by the Almighty how 
to put forth his hand and appropriate the things he needs 
to sustain his life in the flesh, for all this takes place in 
the sphere to which man in the flesh belongs, and he has 
this knowledge naturally. But in the higher spiritual 
realm he has no means of knowing any thing he must 
do, except as the knowledge is imparted by our Heavenly 
Father. We must, therefore, if we walk at all, walk by 
faith and not by sight. If we are told to repent, we re- 
pent; not that we can understand all the relations that 
repentance may have to our salvation, but because our 
loving and wise Sovereign has directed us to repent. If 
we are told to be baptized, we obey for the very same rea- 
son; and, when we have obeyed, we look back to the grave, 
where our sins are buried, without asking the question, 
How can water affect our sins? but have full knowl- 
edge that Jesus is the Author of eternal salvation to all 
that obey him, and with full confidence that what God 
has promised he is able also to perform. Thus in the 
very beginning of our new life, we commence our walk 
by faith, by unquestioning obedience to the Son of God; 
and, in receiving remission of sins through his blood, we 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES 389 

are assured that he is the Author of eternal salvation 
to all that obey him, of the free forgiveness we enjoy 
here; and, continuing by the grace of God to obey, 
we are confident expectants of eternal life beyond the 
grave. 



390 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



THE STRAIT GATE AND NARROW WAY. 

" Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and 
few there be that find it." — Matthew vii. 14. 

There is no other government witti laws so unyield- 
ing as that of the kingdom of heaven ; there is no other 
Sovereign Avhose sway is so arbitrary and unlimited as 
that of our Lord Jesus Christ. He lays down his law 
in his own chosen way, and those who will may obey that 
law, and be assured by it of the forgiveness of sins and 
a hope of eternal life ; but all who refuse to literally 
obey the law may reason and speculate as they will, 
they can never get God's assurance that they are ac- 
cepted of him. When the Son of God was on earth, and 
about to ascend to his rightful glory on high, he left 
chosen men behind him who were to proclaim his law, 
and centuries before the prophet had declared, " For out 
of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord 
from Jerusalem '^ (Isa ii. 3). Accordingly, we find those 
whom he has chosen laying the foundation of the new 
kingdom, and unfolding the law of initiation into it in the 
city of Jerusalem ; and from that day until this present 
hour, there has been no change in it, and no human being 
has ever had the promise of God that his sins were for- 
given, and that he was received into the kingdom of 
heaven, who did not obey the law as proclaimed then by 
the embassadors of Jesus Christ. If one turn to the 
second chapter of the Acts of Apostles, and read it care- 
fully through, he will find it therein expressed, in unam- 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 391 

biguous terms, plain and easily understood, the law with 
which we must comply to be admitted to citizenship in a 
kingdom whose Sovereign is the Son of God, and whose 
subjects shall never die. You may search the Scriptures 
through, and while you will often find the same law re- 
peated, with its terms sometimes amj^lified and sometimes 
more tersely stated, you will find no law repealing it, 
and you will look in vain for even an intimation that sal- 
vation can be obtained on any other terms than those here 
stated. Sometimes when this law is insisted on by those 
zealous for the word of God, as containing the only terms 
on which God offers forgiveness of sins and a hope of eter- 
nal life, it is said : " What difference does it make what 
road a man travels over, if he only gets to heaven? 
What difference does it make what road a man travels to 
haul his grain to market, if he only reaches it, and his 
grain is good?" But there is dangerous sophistry in such 
a question. Tliere may be more roads than one to a 
market-place; but if there are a score of them, there are 
tens of thousands of them just as good, apparently, which 
do not lead to the market at alL The Saviour said : 
^^ Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, w^iieh leadeth 
imto life, and few there be that find it" (Matthew vii. 14). 
His view was certainly more comprehensive than ours, 
and if there had been many roads to life, he could have 
discovered them, but he sees only one, and solemnly warns 
us that it is strait. Dear friends, if all who are honest 
and faithful, shall reach heaven at last, who of us will 
get there by separate roads? If we meet each other in 
glory, and from tbat height look back on our pathway, 
we shall see that our human vision led us to make dis- 
tinctions where there were none, and that we were all 
in the same narrow way after all. I do not mean to ex- 
press an opinion on this subject, for I do not understand 



392 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

my mission to be that of expressing my own views in re- 
gard to the salvation of men, but that of preaching the 
word of God. But suppose w^e admit a possibility of more 
roads than one leading to heaven, there can be no more 
than one to us, unless they are pointed out to us. If there 
are many, and our guide shows us but one, and leads the 
way himself in that one, it is the same to us as though 
there was but one in existence. When we use figures it 
is easy, unless we are very careful to become confused by 
the forms of our own figure. Let us, for a moment, care- 
fully examine this figure of a way or road leading to 
eternal life. When a man is lost and w^andering in a 
wilderness, and is aware of the fact that somewhere there 
is a path cut out through which many feet have traveled, 
and which is easy to walk in, though it is narrow and 
bordered by savage thickets and tangled jungles, when 
his feet strikes the path he feels safer and will be very 
careful to keep it. To men lost and wandering in the 
wilderness of sin, it is a strong way of offering a hope of 
escape to say there is a way — a path straight through this 
dark place to eternal day. But we must be careful to 
keep in view the difference between natural things and 
i\\Q immaterial. Man is lost as a spiritual being, he can 
have no happy home but heaven, and it is cut off from 
home by a dark, and tangled, and dreadful region, 
which, without a captain to lead him, and fight for him, 
and carry him when he is ready to fall down, overcome 
by the terrors of the way and a path for his feet to tread 
in, he can never hope to pass. We see about us and 
above us, and feel within us the evidences that there is a 
Great Being who wields the mighty forces of nature, and 
that the home we long for is forever glorious with his 
presence, and forever happy in his love. Our souls are 
full of indescribable longings, our hearts are breaking 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 393 

with yearnings for the things we can have only when we 
shall have reached our Father's house — our happy, happy 
home. AVe love and are loved again ; we bind ourselves 
together with earthly ties; they snap asunder when we love 
the most, and our hearts quiver, and bleed, and throb 
with anguish, and no place can satisfy us but a home 
where loved ones will never part, and where the ten- 
drils of our affections may entwine themselves around 
objects about which they may cling forever. Oh ! loving 
wife and husband, when and where do you see a 
time in the future when you will be willing, perfectly 
Avilling, to give each other up and wander on alone? 
Fiither and mother ! what hour do you see approaching 
when you can calmly and coldly put your children away 
from your bosoms into the bosom of mother-earth? Oh! 
never, never ! You watch by the cradle, you stretch out 
helpless hands, you cry aloud in your pain, you feel your 
heart-string break in your intense desire to grapple with 
death himself, and tear his cold hands away from the life 
of your babe. Your prayers go up : O God ! give us life 
for our child ; leave it in our arms for yet a little while. 
It may be the child is left. It lives, and grows, and be- 
comes the more dear to you as its mind is more and more 
developed. Then the call comes. Are you ready? No, no ! 
Oh, no ! you are never ready ; you never will. Your na- 
ture is as deep as eternity, and your affections will be sat- 
isfied only when they grasp an object to which they may 
cling forever. It is heaven you want, and nothing short 
of heaven will be a home of rest, and peace, and perfect 
joy. But oh ; that wilderness of sin, with its pits and 
morasses of disease, and its awful gulph of death, how 
shall it be passed ? With your face homeward, with 
your eyes lifted up towards heaven, you rise up and try 
to go forward only to find your feet beset with snares, 



394 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

and slipping in the devious mazes of sin. You fall, and 
rise only to fall again, and with many wounds and 
bruises, you are ready to despair and lie down in the 
wilderness to die. It was terrible when those men out 
on the prairies of the West were making their way to 
their own homes, and friends, and firesides, and were 
overtaken in a great storm, and perished, some of them, 
in sight of the light that flashed from their own win- 
dows. But infinitely more terrible it is to know that 
there is a God and a heaven, a Father and a peaceful 
home, and to lie down in despair to die because of sin. 
But when the loving wife and children put lights in the 
cottage window to guide the struggling, straggling, de- 
spairing husband and father, who had abandoned his load 
and his team, fighting his way through the drifts of 
snow, they could put no strong arm about his freezing 
form ; could force no new life into his feebly beating 
heart. They could but gaze out into the weary waste 
towards the spot where the strong man had fallen at last, 
while ih.Q wintry blast sang his requiem, and the falling 
snow-flakes wove his shroud and became his grave. But 
our Father in heaven, looking upon us in our wander- 
ings and misery and death in a world of sin, could not 
only hang up the great sun of heaven to tell us we 
have a Father; but laying help on one that was mighty, 
he could send us a Deliverer, enfold us in loving. Almighty 
arms, and make a path for us through the wastes of 
sin. And all this he did. He so loved the world, that he 
gave his only-begotten Son, to take upon him, not all 
that we suffered only, but a great deal more ; for he came 
to pioneer the way, and, single-handed, fight and conquer 
the author of sin. and demolish his prison-house of 
death. Men fled from him in his great conflicts for us, 
for they could not help him, and at last he entered that 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 395 

dark and dismal retreat, where death had long held soli- 
tary and undisputed sovereign sway, only to come forth 
the conqueror, and to hold forever, as his own, the keys 
of hades and death. Having fought with all the power 
of the Son of God for every step he gained, and left his 
blood upon the path he cleared, he is taken up into glory ; 
but, blessed be God, not till " after that he through the 
Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the apostles 
whom he had chosen" (Acts i. 2). And these command- 
ments were that they should tarry at Jerusalem until 
power from on high should come upon them, that they 
might be able to tell a lost world how to start to follow 
Jesus through the path he had fought for and won ; and 
how they should follow him until they were led safely 
through the gulf of death itself, and ascended the other 
side to sit down with him in endless glory, and share 
with him the boundless happiness of heaven. Jesus him- 
self promised to send them the Holy Spirit to help and 
inspire them in their work, and told them he would thus 
be with the struggling world forever; but it was men 
who were to speak, and in human ways make known to 
other men the path of life. This speaking was first done, 
and this path first pointed out, as we have already inti- 
mated, on the first pentecost after his return to heaven, 
and the things said are clearly recorded in the second 
chapter of the Acts of Apostles. Now the figure of a 
way or path is a striking and beautiful one ; but we must 
carefully bear in mind all the time that it is a figure. It 
is not a material way thrown up and ditched at the sides, 
so that another of the same kind might be thrown up, 
leaving it for a model. The figure is a road which men 
may walk in with feet of flesh. The reality is a law di- 
recting us what to do, and how to live, so that our lives 
may be in conformity to the will of God. 



396 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

It is a long path, as long as our own natural lives; 
but being out of it, and stumbling in the thickets of sin, 
it must have a beginning place where we can commence 
to walk in it; and, according to the Saviour's own 
words, it must be entered by a strait gate, and when 
it is entered, we shall find it a narrow path. 

Before we search for the gate and endeavor to point it 
out, there are some things to which our attention should 
be called, which, being left from view, will make us 
think the gate too homely and plain in its appearance to 
be what it really is. We are not to make our own road, 
for human genius had wasted itself in fruitless efforts to 
do this for four thousand years, and had made not a 
step's advance ; we are to solve no puzzling questions ; 
we are to devise no systems; we are to lean on no arm 
less strong than that of him who conquered death. The 
road is finished; it can receive no improving touches 
from the hand of man, for the author and finisher said 
to the Father who sent him, "I have finished the work 
which thou gavest me to do.'' Many difficulties have 
occurred on this question because so many men investi- 
gate it with the feeling that the salvation of lost souls 
is a stupendous work, w^hich it indeed is, and that of 
necessity it involves something wonderful on the part of 
man. Let us bear in mind the fact, that God has under- 
taken the stupendous part, and left us only w^hat human- 
ity can perform easily enough. Right at this point 
human pride has done much mischief. Men of learn- 
ing and intellectual power vastly overrate themselves, 
and imagine that their learning is necessary all the time 
in order to assist the heavenly Father in saving men. 
They feel, of course, that the humble and ignorant are 
to be saved by the gospel, but that, after all, they must 
of necessity depend upon the educated and great for their 



I 



I 



iSERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 397 

knowledge of the gospel itself. Now, the truth is, dear 
friends, that when the gospel plan of salvation is the 
subject of investigation, the cultivated and highly edu- 
cated mind has no advantage whatever over the most 
humble one who can hear and believe. I do not mean 
to disparage learning, nor the eiforts of great men to il- 
lustrate and teach the Scriptures, for none can doubt that 
Christianity owes much to their efforts ; but what I 
mean to express is this: if an ignorant man hears God's 
word say do so and so, in clear unambiguous terms, he 
knows what he hears and makes up his mind whether he 
will do it or not. If he starts the question. Why does 
God command this, and why does he not command 
something else? he can not answer them, and in this 
respect the most highly educated man is on a perfect 
equality with him, for he can not answer them either. 
If the question is. Will obedience to God be the means 
by which w^e may lay hold on salvation? an ignorant 
man can resolve the question and come to a satisfactory 
and fixed conclusion; but if the question is. What are 
all the relations of this obedience to the vast plans and 
purposes of God? human ignorance and human learning 
are both ignorant alike, for neither one nor the other 
can know any thing about the question. When God is 
shaking the earth with some mighty convulsion, a dwarf 
and a giant alike can see the visible effects, but the hand 
of a giant can no more stay an earthquake in its swing 
than can the hand of the dwarf. They both sink into 
such littleness, in comparison with the work they under- 
take, that the difference in their strength is not seen at 
all. When an humble sinner, whose education is most 
limited, and the most cultivated man on earth start in 
together to unravel God's unrevealed mysteries, they are 



398 JOH]^ PACKEE MITCHELL. 

T)otli so infinitesimally small that tlie difference between 
them is not to be perceived at all. 

When scholastic pride and philosophical research bows 
their heads in the dust at the feet of Jesus, saying, 
'^Thou art the way, and the truth, and the life; speak 
that we may obey and teach others to obey thy voice,'' 
they become valuable auxiliaries in the great salvation 
of which He is the author. But when they thrust them- 
selves between perishing sinners and the words of life, 
saying, I can grasp mysteries too deep for you, I can see 
the ends which these commandments are meant to secure, 
and I can show you an easier, or more beautiful, or 
pleasant way, they merit such contempt only, and scorn 
and hissing, as Avill bring them to see that, in comparison 
with God, their learning is no learning at all. 

Looking on us as God does, from a height infinitely 
above us, he sees no difference in this respect between 
men, and has no softly carpeted path for wealthy feet to 
tread, no scholastic door through which the learned may 
enter, and no second class arrangement for the humble 
poor. As we are all to be one in Christ Jesus, we are 
all to pass through the same strait gate and iread the 
same narrow way. 

Since man has done his utmost and failed completely 
to make the slightest progress in his own way, and then 
God was "manifest in the flesh" to open up a pathway 
for us, we should expect that we will find the way, not 
by the wisdom of man, but by the direction of God. 
Taking us just as we are, what we need is not direction 
from man or human learning or skill, but aid from God 
himself. We needed one to make "a way'' for us where 
there was none ; and when we see Jesus begin just where 
all humanity begins — in infancy — and tread every step 
of a human life until he sleeps in the grave, then to 



SER3WNS AND ADDRESSES. 399 

rise and triumph and ascend into heaven, we know there 
is a way paved up by him into the holiest. The first 
thing, then, would seem to be that we should know the 
facts concerning Jesus Christ, and dwell upon these facts 
until we are ready to surrender our whole nature to his 
authority. When we are willing to do this we have 
faith. The words of these men whom he left at Jerusa- 
lem to await the coming of the Holy Spirit will have 
weight with us only when we learn that they are deliv- 
ering the will of God. And well do they know this, for 
their first proceeding is to present Jesus Christ to the 
people as the glorified one of the Father and Lord of 
all; and when this is apprehended, and men cry out, 
'^What shall we do?^^ the answer comes sealed with the 
authority of the Son of God. It does not, and it ought 
not present something difficult to do, or difficult to un- 
derstand. It ought to be simple, for it is to be the law 
for all the saved. If men and women, in their pride of 
learning, or their wealth, or any thing else, will say it 
is too simple, it is too easy, it is an unworthy beginning 
of so great a work, they can; no one will prevent them. 
If they seek out something else, saying it will do, they 
can; no force will be employed to prevent them. Sal- 
vation is graciously offered, it does not compel any to 
accept it. To all mankind who do not believe in Jesus 
Christ, the gospel preaches only the man Christ Jesus, 
the Son of God. To all who believe in him it says, 
as it has always said. Repent, and be baptized every 
one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission 
of sins. Whoever comes Avith a believing and penitent 
heart, and is baptized for the remission of sins, can point 
to the promise of a covenant keeping God, and say, 
"My sins are forgiven, and I am a child of God.^' 
If there is another way to secure this promise, I have 



400 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

not' seen it, and I firmly believe it is not revealed in 
the Bible. 

Sometimes it is said of us, because we insist on tbis 
strait and narrow way of the apostles, that we are un- 
charitable, that we think we are the only people who 
are on the road to heaven. But, dear friends, you do 
us great injustice. What we want is God's word for it 
that we are saved from sin. We find it here in con- 
nection with his ordinances, and we fail to see it any- 
where else. If any have found the same promise in any 
other way, they have accomplished more than we can, 
and no thinking on our part will wTench away this 
promise from them. But oh! are you sure you have 
God's promise? and is there not reason to fear that the 
words of man are leading you astray? We claim no 
right to dictate to any one; we ardently hope that very 
many may be saved for whom, in our present c?rcum- 
stances, we can find no promise of God recorded. But 
all our hopes and all of theirs, all oar opinions and all 
of theirs, can be no anchor to the soul, sure and stead- 
fast, and reaching to that within the vail. 

When it is said to us: ^^ There is as good people in 
other religious organizations, perhaps better, than among 
you; and how dare you find fault with others?" it has 
no bearing upon the case in hand. We find no fault 
with what is good, we honor and admire it wherever it 
is found. If you fill us with regret that we are not 
better than we are, when you point out our delinquencies, 
you do not weaken in any degree the force of the pl-ea 
we make for strict, undeviating obedience to the plain 
and unequivocal word of God. 

W^hen God tells us how to pass the strait gate and 
begin our journey in the narrow way, we know that our 
beginning is well made ; after that a long journey may 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 401 

be before us, with many failures, many toils and many 
sorrows; but with Jesus as our leader, we hope to tri- 
umph at last, and enter with him into eternal joys. 
Dear brethren, it is for us to strive to relax no effort to 
persevere in faith, and, sustained by hope until the call 
comes inviting us over into the joys of our Lord, I feel 
painfully over our own imperfections; and those of you 
who hear me often will bear me witness that much of 
my preaching has been in the way of exhorting the dis- 
ciples of Christ to greater exertions, to urge them to 
work out their salvation with fear and trembling. 

May God help us all to do our duty, and secure eter- 
nal life, is my constant prayer. 



34 



402 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



ALL THINGS WOEK TOGETHER FOR GOOD. 

"And we know that all things work together for good to them that 
love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. For 
whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the 
image of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brethren. 
Moreover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called ; and whom he 
called, them he justified; and whom he justified, them he also glori- 
fied."— Komans viii. 28-30. 

The last two verses of our text are often cited in sup- 
port of the doctrine of " eternal election/^ which not only 
presents a portion of humanity as having been chosen to 
eternal life from the beginning, but also teaches that 
another part of mankind has had the same kind of elec- 
tion to eternal reprobation; thus, in both instances, 
practically destroying the idea that the human will is 
free, making men mere machines, operating as impelled 
by forces they can in no way control, and yet making 
thexQ. capable of enduring an eternity of hopeless misery. 
To meet this ruinous use of this Scripture, some think 
that Paul had reference to the Jews only and their past 
history; but it is doubtful whether any one was ever 
really satisfied with this explanation : and certainly it 
does not seem to harmonize with other parts of the Roman 
letter in their full scope. Manifestly the persons whom 
God foreknew, according to the 29th verse, are the very 
same for whom all things work together for good, accord- 
ing: to the 28th verse. But let us have an illustration: 
The Constitution of the United States contains a provision 
for the election of a President of the Republic; and when 



SER3fONS AND ADDRESSES. 403 

I say that Andrew Jackson was called to be President 
according to the purpose of the framers of the constitu- 
tion, I mean no more than that he became President 
imder the forms of law which they established. Our 
fathers ordained and established a Constitution for these 
United States in the last century, and yet all who are 
obedient to it, and secure the political rights and privi- 
leges it guarantees, secure them according to the fore- 
knowledge of the fathers. Our Heavenly Father has 
perfected a system according to a purpose he had in view 
before time began. He pointed out the exact things we 
are to do to be conformed to the image of his Son, and 
some of the things he is to do for us; but not all of them; 
for we are to trust him to do all that is necessary to be 
done which we are not required to do, and have not the 
power to do ourselves. Whenever we are ready to em- 
ploy these means, and thus become co-workers with God, 
we are "the called according to his purpose.'^ We can 
perceive plainly, that when one becomes President under 
the forms of law laid down by the fathers, he is not com- 
pelled to be President. He is not taken hold of by the 
laws and forced into office in spite of himsel£ We see 
that the freedom of the will is a part — and a necessary 
part too — in making him President, and yet, all this being 
foreseen and provided for by the law-makers, he goes into 
office according to their original purpose. The same 
reasoning is good when we apply it to the calling of the 
Almighty of a righteous and holy family in Christ Jesus. 
We have only to conceive of a law-maker who knows 
all things, and sees the end from the beginning, without 
possibility of mistake. Then when he designed to call 
and justify, and glorify an innumerable company, and 
made the freedom of the will of every one of them a part 
of the plan, does it not follow that whenever one accepts 



404 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

God's own plan, and cJiooses the good part, he is called 
according to his purpose; he was predestinated from the 
beginning; he is elect according to the foreknowledge 
of God, who so elects to eternal life all who will come to 
him through Jesus Christ his Son? 

It is those, then, thus elected, to-wit: all the children 
of Adam who love God — obedience being the proof of 
love — for whom all things work (not separately and in 
single and distinct capacities) ; but " all things work 
together for good to them that love God." 

We might refer to many evidences furnished us in the 
history of the past in proof of this proposition; we might 
trace what we have of the world's history for six thou- 
sand years, and show that very often when the people of 
God were bowed down in gloom, or groaning under 
heavy affliction, they were bringing in a better period 
and a new light for the guidance of those who should 
follow. And we might illustrate by many examples the 
fact that what man, in his selfishness, is apt to exalt as 
the thing of most importance, may, in the providence of 
God, prove to be of minor account, while the things 
least regarded by men at the time of their occurrence, 
turn out to be of greatest moment. 

When the whole earth was filled with the fame of the 
Pharaohs, and Egypt saw her brightest days, a poor slave 
boy was brought into the land by some Ishmaelitish mer- 
chants, and became the property of an Egyptian captain. 
The poor old shepherd father, from whose arms the boy 
had been torn, far away in the land of Canaan, rent his 
clothes, and put on sackcloth, and mourned, refusing to 
be comforted, saying "I will go down into the grave 
unto my son mourning." Who could have imagined 
that this poor slave and the stricken old man would exert 
a mighty influence on the world thousands of years after 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 405 

tlie glory of Egypt was hi the dust ? Who was there that 
would not have concluded that Jacob, and his son Joseph, 
and all his family, would be as mere drift tossed on the 
seething flood of time, against the Egyptian greatness, to 
be lost forever from the view of history. In contrast 
with the mighty race which built the pyramids, what 
^^^s the old Canaanite shepherd and his lost son? But 
it was through them that God proposed to fulfill his 
promise, confirmed by his oath, that in Abraham and 
his seed should all the families of the earth be blessed. 
Oood came out of this apparent evil. The old man's 
tears and sorrows, and the youth's banishment into a 
strange land, were as the cloud which contains the 
refreshing rain, ready to be poured out upon the parched 
earth. God foresaw the coming famine and provided,' 
in his own way, that the lost member of the shepherd 
family should become the ruler of all Egypt, and the 
saviour of all his father's household from death. 

But this bright gleam in the dark cloud was but the 
presage to a darker period. Jacob and Joseph were 
gathered to their fathers. Egypt got a king who "knew 
not Joseph ; " and soon all the tribes of Israel were in 
a state of cruel bondage under hard and relentless task- 
masters. Time would fail us to trace out the dealings 
of God with the chosen descendants of Abraham dur- 
ing the long period that they were made the sole earthly 
depositories of a knowledge of the true God. Suffice it 
to note that of the afflictions and sorrows, as well as the 
joys and pleasures of Israel, the great purpose of God 
was being evolved, and through thousands of years events 
were being controlled and molded so that all should 
work upward to the time when God's own Son should 
be born into the world, and the voice of angels should 
proclaim the beginning of the new and glorious era of 



406 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

the Prince of Peace. During all this long period many 
a man of God was bowed down in sorrow, and the grave 
closed over many who never saw the good that was being 
developed from all they suifered. There were wars and 
captivities, and tears and sorrows ; but they all led up to 
the introduction into our sin-stricken world of the adora- 
ble One who "came to take away sin by the sacrifice of 
himself." And since then all things are working onward 
to a period still more glorious, when we shall hear a 
voice out of heaven saying, " Behold the tabernacle of 
God is with men ; and he will dwell with them, and 
they shall be his people ; and God himself shall be with 
them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all 
tears from their eyes : and there shall be no more death, 
neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any 
more pain, for the former things are passed away." 

The Sun of righteousness has risen and is high in the 
heavens. His glorious rays are beaming upon the earth, 
and the voice calls pleadingly and unceasingly: '^Who- 
ever will let him take of the water of life freely.'^ Oh ! 
reader, will you accept the call? Will you be of those 
who manifest the only love which God recognizes, by 
keeping his commandments, and so have the blissful 
assurance that all things are working together under the 
directing hand of the Almighty for your good? There 
is no promise that good is being worked out for those 
who will not obey God. But the solemn warning is 
often given, that indescribable anguish and woe are 
awaiting all who refuse submission to the will of God. 

We are all storm-tossed on a raging and fathomless 
ocean; we are passing over: but, oh, friends, have you 
taken passage in the ship that is guided by God^s own 
hand, and which the storms and tossings of life's rough 
sea are only hurrying more rapidly to the glad and 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 407 

peaceful haven? Or have you trusted your all to the 
other vessel, which is rent and torn and tossed by fierce 
tempests, and hurried every hour to a fearful and gloomy 
coast, where no mariner has ever found a safe landing; 
where lost spirits wander in fearful unrest, awaiting the 
dreadful hour when they shall be banished forever from 
the presence of the Lord and the glory of his power? 
Come unto the life-giving rays which are to shine for 
eternity. Let no one imagine that the clouds of infi- 
delity and of human wickedness will have power long 
to obscure this glorious Sun. All things have worked 
for the good of God's people in the past, and impotent 
and trifling must be all the efforts of men and demons 
to keep back the day which is rising higher and higher, 
and brighter and brighter, bringing in the time when the 
Saviour will come in the clouds of heaven, with all his 
hosts of shining angels, to consummate the grand work — 
when "the kingdoms of this world shall become the 
kingdoms of our Lord and his anointed, and he shall 
reign for ever and ever.'' 

The gloom of winter may hang heavy and cold, and 
his icy hand may grasp with cruel clutch the tender 
plant which sighs in the breezes of spring and the gentle 
breath of summer; the darkness of his long nights may 
creep heavily upon the mornings and evenings, seeming 
to make daily advances toward a time when it will be all 
night, without any day-dawn or sun ; but the great orb 
of day hangs as securely, and his rays beam as brightly, 
as when God first bade him rule the day. It is the 
groaning earth, sweeping onward in her orbit, which 
makes the long nights and the gloomy days of winter. 
Soon she sweeps around the mighty arc, and we know 
that, not heaven but earth, has brought the changes 
which we have known through the seasons; for, swing- 



408 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

ing in his car of fire, the same sun, unchanged and 
changeless, begins to lengthen out our days. The soft 
air of spring comes breathing gently upon the icy prison 
in which winter has held the flowers ; his grasp relaxes ; 
his nights grow shorter ; his gloom departs, and all move 
forward to the bright sun and balmy breezes of summer. 
Whose hand shall shorten the day as the seasons march 
onw^ard? Who shall bid the night encroach upon the 
dawn when the bright sun ushers in the sweet May 
morning? Who can stay the work of God? Who shall 
stand in the path of all the mighty forces of nature? 
Who shall say to God's onward moving and eternal pur- 
pose, Thou shalt never be consummated? Who shall suc- 
cessfully resist the arm of Omnipotence who is fighting 
the battles of his people? 

"All things work together for good to them that love 
God.'^ Oh ! sinner, be persuaded to give him the love 
of your whole heart while he pleads in tenderest accents, 
and points to the exhibition of his boundless love for us 
in the person of his Son, bowed down in the garden, 
bleeding on the cross. Wait not for the hour when, 
with howling demons and writhing spirits of lost men, 
you will be compelled to confess the power and majesty 
of him you refuse to love. 

May the mighty love which gave the Architect of the 
universe to die for us, ever constrain us to unceasing 
efforts to be like him in his perfect humanity, that we 
may share forever in the glory, power and happiness of 
his perfect divinity. 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 409 



THINGS TEMPORAL AND THINGS ETERNAL. 

IDiscourse delivered in Forest, Hi, September 19, 1869.] 

" What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world, and lose his 
own soul?" — Matthew xvi. 26. 

This saving of the Saviour is often quoted and com- 
mented upon ; but how few, even of his followers, ever 
seriously study the lesson inculcated, and seek to make 
its teaching a practical part of their lives. I have often 
thought that few of us give that attention to the discourses 
of Jesus which their importance merits. When he was 
on earth, and while he was believed to be only the hum- 
ble son of an humble carpenter, his enemies were com- 
pelled to say of him: "Never man spake like this man'' 
(John vii. 46). If we regard him as no more than a 
wonderfully gifted — a powerful Son of man, every saying 
of his is worthy of the most careful study, and we could 
but derive great benefit to ourselves as mere creatures of 
time, from a comprehension of the wise thoughts to 
which he gave utterance during his brief but wonderfully 
active sojourn among men. But when we know him to 
be not a Son of man only but the Son of God, and real- 
ize that he was filled with that wisdom which framed the 
universe from nothing, and governs it at will, how ear- 
nestly we ought to seek to understand the whole meaning 
of all that he has said for our instruction. 

One of the peculiarities of the discourses of Jesus, and 
of all of his recorded sayings, is the beautiful simplicity 
which is so striking that it is easy to understand them, 
35 



410 JOHN PACKER MITQHELL, 

because of this very peculiarity. But these enemies of 
our Saviour, who have ventured to make an attack upon 
any thing that fell from his lips, have discovered that 
their superhuman depth of thought and their wonderful 
wisdom, gave them an invulnerable strength as remark- 
able as their simplicity. Who shall ever exhaust the in- 
struction contained in Christ^s sermon on the mount? 
Who shall ever fathom the utmost depths of his beauti- 
ful parables? Who, that has studied them with atten- 
tion, will not testify that the more they are studied the 
more strikingly their beauty, their simplicity, and their 
grand stores of wisdom are displayed? Even when we 
have committed to memory one of the parables of our 
Lord, every time we turn to it we find something new 
and sublime which we had before overlooked. The 
marked difference between all other writings of the New 
Testament and the reported discourses of him who is the 
sublimest of them all, would be sufficient to convince us 
that they were really the words of some superior being, 
and not the mere inventions of the writer. Let any one 
take up the testimony of John, and though he was him- 
self one of the finest of the writers of the Bible, though 
the beauty and simplicity of his style is very remarkable, 
how quickly do we discover a difference when he re- 
ports the discourses and sayings of his beloved Master. 
Nowhere is this more noticeable than in the prayer of our 
Blessed Redeemer uttered in immediate view of his suffer- 
ing and death. That prayer alone ought to be sufficient 
to convince the world that he who uttered it was Divine; 
and the spirit of love, and sympathy, and goodness, which 
breathes throughout it, ought to lead all to love the 
adorable One who gave it utterance. Always when we 
come to study closely any thing which Jesus said or did 
we find in it a depth and a significance which we can not 



I 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 411 

fully fathom uiilil we study the whole glorious design 
which he came among us to fulfill. Though the lan- 
guage is plain and perfectly intelligible, and though those 
who heard and we who read have no diiBculty in under- 
standing the words uttered, yet there is a depth in it all 
which all who heard Christ's words failed fully to com- 
prehend, and which, in the full light of the subsequent 
revelations of the gospel, we may study all our life-time 
with profit, and leave much then which shall be only 
fully known to us when we are permitted to gaze into the 
mysteries of the eternal state. 

The lesson we now have before us does not diifer in 
this respect from many others Avith which the teachings 
of Christ abound. There is much for us to think about 
before we are in a condition to appreciate the lesson at 
all ; and when we have studied with all the helps we can 
get, there is still in the unsounded depths something which 
we can only fathom when we shall have gone over, and 
shall have been able from eternal knowledge to compare the 
bliss of the redeemed with the transitory things of this 
life. Only when we shall have eternally seen what hor- 
rors accumulate around the lost soul, and what transcend- 
ent bliss is enjoyed by the redeemed, can we know the 
full import of our Saviour's question: "What does it 
profit a man if he gain the whole world, and lose his own 
soul?'' 

Let us look at the whole subject in its proper connec- 
tion, and learn w^hat we may of the meaning conveyed by 
the words of Jesus to those who heard him. In the first 
place, let us understand the connection, and know what 
called forth this language. Turning back to the 16th 
verse of the chapter before us, we find the confession of 
Peter of that grand truth on w^hich our faith is founded, 
that " Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God." 



41 2 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

Many have not observed^ that in making this confession, 
they failed utterly to comprehend its significance. He 
had the idea of Christ which was common to his Jewish 
brethren, which was obtained by false interpretation of 
the prophets. They, one and all, expected him to be of 
the seed of David, which was correct enough, but was not 
comprehensive enough. They all expected him to be a 
temporal ruler, who should overturn all the thrones of 
earth, and sway the scepter of Israel with a thousand fold 
greater splendor than Solomon, over a prostrate world. 
Even the chosen disciples of Jesus failed to get a more 
correct understanding of the nature of the Messiah up to 
the time we are now considering. And when they fol- 
lowed him about the world, and beheld the wonderful 
miracles which he performed, they saw in these mani- 
festations — Divine poAver — only a proof that whenever he 
chose to exercise it, he had the ability to seat himself 
upon a throne and conquer the world. They realized and 
reasoned that one who could raise the dead, calm the 
tempest, walk upon the sea, and use all the elements of 
nature as his pliant servants, would have no difficulty 
whatever as soon as his conquering warfare begun. And 
even after his resurrection from the dead, they failed to 
comprehend the nature of his kingdom, for just before his 
ascension into heaven, we find them asking him : " Lord, 
wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Is- 
rael ? '^ Then when Peter made the sublime confession : 
'^ Thou art the Christ,'^ etc., with him this just simply 
meant the Jewish Messiah, and his work comprehended 
only the restoration of Israel to more than it had lost of 
the pomp, and glory, and wealth which pertains to this 
world. And till long after he was preaching the gospel 
under the direction of the Holy Spirit did he come him- 
self to understand the grand meaning of his own words. 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 413 

Not until ^^God made choice that by his mouth the Gen- 
tiles should hear the ^vord of the gospel and believe," 
did he learn the full import of his words on this occa- 
sion, and of the words of his Master in reply. This view 
is necessary that we may understand what follows. For 
no sooner was the recognition of Jesus as the Christ 
made, than he began to show unto his disciples how that 
he must go unto Jerusalem and suffer many things of the 
elders, and chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and 
raised again the third day (21st verse). Peter strenuously 
objected to this, for in his view, all this was entirely in- 
consistent with the character and powers of the Christ. 
But let the sacred rejcord speak for itself: " Then Peter 
took him and began to rebuke him, Be it far from thee, 
Lord! this shall not be unto thee. But he turned and 
said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan : thou art an 
offense unto me ; for thou savorest not the things that be 
of God, but those that be of men" (22-24). Then fol- 
lows the beautiful lesson in which the sentence under con- 
sideration occurs. The Saviour draws the line distinctly 
between the nature of his kingdom, and all others which 
had ever been established on earth, and declared that his 
design is not to make men great, or wealthy, or famous in 
this life; but that the reward that his followers should 
receive would be bestowed when '^the Son of man shall 
come in the glory of his Father, with his angels." And 
there are many at this very day who can see no excuse for 
Peter and his brethren, who yet fail entirely to apply to 
themselves the lesson here taught. They fail to under- 
stand the nature of the kingdom of Christ, and the duty 
of his followers, even with all the light of subsequent 
revelation; yet find fault with the Jews for the same mis- 
take before the kingdom was set up. For eighteen hun- 
dred years the divine religion of Christ has been in the 



414 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

world. Wherever the Bible has gone, all have an oppor- 
tunity to study aud understand it, and yet, alas! how few 
have really learned to deny themselves and take up their 
cross and follow Jesus. How few there are who do not 
seek to accommodate this blessed religion to their own 
fleshly desires, instead of accommodating their whole na- 
ture to it? How many try to not see the lesson here 
taught, instead of desiring to learn and practice its 
teaching. The religion exemplified in the life of Jesus 
Christ, and practiced and taught by his apostles, was 
wholly different from any thing the world had before known, 
was opposite to all human views on the subject, and dem- 
onstrates by this very antagonism to all human philoso- 
phy the divinity of its origin. No human mind could 
ever have imagined that the true happiness of man and 
his eternal existence depended upon a subjugation of the 
very desires whose gratification seemed to him his only 
source of pleasure. None but God could possibly have 
known that the spiritual life of man depended upon the 
curbing of his natural appetites, and that the Christian 
religion demands this of all who receive it as proof pos- 
itive of its divine origin. Who, but he who made the 
wonderful soul, body, and spirit of which we are pos- 
sessed, could have known that to subject the flesh to the 
spirit would result, not only in the perfection of the 
spirit, but the glorification of the body also ; for ^ve are 
encouraged in the warfare we wage with our animal na- 
ture by the language of the Apostle Paul : " For the 
creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by 
reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope; be- 
cause the creature itself also shall be delivered from the 
bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the 
children of God ^^ (Eom. viii. 20, 21). No wonder, if when 
this religion was first spoken of by the Saviour, his fol^ 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 415 

lowers failed to appreciate it, Avhen even now so many who 
profess to follow him fail to practice it. It has often 
seemed to me that for the want of appreciation of the 
very lesson here inculcated, and oftentimes more fully 
elaborated in the teachings of the apostles, many persons 
who begin the Christian life with the very best intentions, 
ere long fail to keep up with its requirements and fall 
away. They misapprehend its teachings in the start, and by 
attempting to mold it to themselves, instead of themselves 
to it, they soon discourage their own heart in the vain 
labor they have undertaken; for it is an institution which 
fixes its own standard, and allows none to change it. 

Up to Christ^s appearance in the world, as we have 
before remarked, the doctrine he taught had never been 
known ; and as the perfection of his religious system 
depended on his OAvn death for a fuller elaboration of 
its principles, we must turn to the teachings of those 
chosen by himself and qualified for their work by the 
Holy Spirit. AYe might refer to very many of the say- 
ings of the apostles on this subject in their letters to 
those who had put on Christ; for they are the burden 
of many admonitions and exhortations, but one or two 
will be suficient to make plain the meaning of the 
Saviour when he says. Let a man deny himself. The 
first to which we refer is Eom. vi. 18, 19: ^' Being then 
made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteous- 
ness. I speak after the manner of men, because of the 
infirmity of your flesh : for as ye have yielded your 
members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity, unto 
iniquity ; even so now yield up your members servants 
to righteousness, unto holiness. '^ AYe understand the 
apostle Paul here to define more fully what it is for 
one to deny himself. He must deny gratification to 
those lusts which dominated over him before he became 



416 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

a Christian, and gave character to his whole life. He 
must now deny himself, and devote his members to 
the service of Christ; for, as the apostle says in an- 
other place, ^^Ye are Christ's; and Christ is God's'' (1 
Cor. iii. 23). In his address to the Ephesian elders 
(Acts XX. 28) he speaks of the church as having been 
purchased by his own blood. And again (1 Cor. vi. 
20) : " For ye are bought with a price : therefore glo- 
rify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are 
God's." ^^ Being buried with Christ by baptism, w^e are 
baptized into his death, and rise to walk in newness 
of life." "We through the Spirit do mortify the deeds 
of the body." But in denying ourselves we are not 
to afilict, and lacerate, and abuse the body, for it is 
Christ's as well as the Spirit'. AVe are to take up our 
cross and follow him by employing our faculties in his 
service. We have need of soul, body, and spirit for 
the proper service of Christ; and when all these are 
actively engaged in the work we are truly Christians, 
and ready to say, w^ith Paul, " For me to live is Christ ; 
but to die is gain." But we may inquire. What may 
we regard as the service of Christ? We answer, what- 
ever an honest, well instructed Christian may ask God 
to bless and help him in doing; and no better general 
rule than this can be laid down for the guidance of 
our whole lives. The body belongs to Christ. Satan 
had possession of it, and Christ bought it with his blood. 
We are tenants at will, and while we live in the flesh 
that life that we now live in the flesh, we are bound to 
take care of and preserve the house that our Master 
owns and has left in our care ; therefore, all the efibrts 
it requires to feed, clothe, and protect the body are pro- 
per eflbrts, and are properly performed in our Master's 
service. We can conscientiously ask God's blessing on 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 417 

all such eiforts, and ought certainly so to do. AYe obey 
the injunction — to j^resent our bodies a living sacrifice, 
holy, acceptable unto God — when we thus subordinate 
all our strength to the service of Jesus Christ. And 
this brings us properly to the consideration of the ques- 
tion : " What does it profit a man if he gain the whole 
world and lose his own soul?" If a man lend all the 
energies he possesses to the accumulation of wealth for "his 
own gratification, what is he profited when the few and 
fleeting years of the present life are passed? What if 
he have heaped to himself millions ; if vessels laden 
with his riches ride on every sea; if his broad acres 
spread out on every hand; if his cattle feed on a thou- 
sand hills, can all do ought for him when his unclothed 
spirit is called into the presence of God? We might 
dwell on this question for hours, and contemplate it in 
many forms, but our own minds answer it at every turn, 
Nothing; absolutely nothing! All that a man can gain 
for himself in this world profits him nothing; and the 
body he has fed and pampered must go down to feed the 
worms in his own soil, and his spirit must face the wrath 
of an insulted God. To make the question strong, the 
Saviour asks, "If he gain the whole world;" but oh, 
how many lose their souls for a very small portion of 
the world in which they must so soon make their graves. 
But we have not taken up the consideration of this sub- 
ject for the mere purpose of turning the question over 
and over to get various views of the struggle for wealth 
and the horrors of losing the soul. What practical 
lesson is there in it for us? What may we who love 
Christ and want to obey his instructions learn from 
this for our profit? What danger may we avoid, and 
what prize may we secure, by a careful observance of 
the lesson here taught? None of us, perhaps, are in 



418 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

danger of gaining the whole world, but are we in no 
danger of losing our own souls from too great a desire 
to get all of it we can? Do we devote all our powers 
to the service of Christ? Do we regard all that we do, 
and all that we desire, as so much gain for the cause of 
Christ? or do we look upon ourselves as beings who 
may labor for our own selfish gratification all week, and 
propitiate the favor of God by a show of worship one 
day out of seven? Do we make our duty to Christ 
mean only the acts of devotion in which we engage in 
meeting or at the family altar, and separate our duty as 
Christians from our daily actions as men and women in 
the flesh ? Have we one work to perform for ourselves 
and another for Christ? or is all we do done in the 
name of him whose servants we -are ? Let us often ask 
ourselves these questions ; for whenever all that we do 
is not done in the name of the Lord, we are in danger of 
losing our own souls. The question may be asked, How 
much may we possess, or seek to possess, without danger? 
"We answer, by the authority of the Holy ScriptuTres, of 
Christ and the apostles, that we may not hold in our 
own name one foot of land, one dollar in money, nor, 
indeed, any thing that pertains to this world. But this 
may need some explanation. Those who would be fol- 
lowers of Christ, and yet heap to themselves wealth and 
roll in luxury, try hard not to see the lesson of Christ 
on this subject. They turn away from his saying, ^^ It 
is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle 
than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven," 
as if the Saviour had said something with no meaning 
in it — as though his words were wholly thrown away 
and had no instruction in them. But we know that the 
Son of God, during his short residence among men, had 
no time to spare in vain talking; and we know too 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 419 

mncli of liim to believe that he ever said any thing 
which is not worthy of the most serious attention of 
men, for by his words will men be judged in the day 
of eternal judgment. When Jesus said this in regard 
to the rich, his disciples were greatly amazed, and they 
asked him, "Who then can be saved ?'^ And Jesus said 
to them, " With men this is impossible, but with God all 
things are possible'^ (Matt. xix. 24-26). To understand 
this, we must remember that the kingdom of God and 
the kingdom of heaven, spoken of in the New Testa- 
ment, are the same thing, and both mean the Church of 
Christ. We must remember, too, that at the time this 
was spoken, the disciples knew nothing about the nature 
or object of the Church, and, consequently, could not at 
all appreciate the Saviour's meaning any more than they 
understood his mission in the world. But, having the 
advantage of subsequent teaching, we have better means 
of knowing what the Saviour meant than they had when 
he said it. Then, since he says " It is impossible with 
men, but possible to God," how do we find this difficulty 
overcome when the kingdom was actually set up and 
men actually began to come into it? How were the 
rich brought in by his power and wisdom? When we 
would know how and when the kingdom or church was 
erected on earth, we turn to the place where its setting 
up is recorded, and we find it written there in language 
we have no difficulty in understanding. AYhen Jesus 
said to Nicodemus, '^Except a man be born again he 
can not see the kingdom of God,'' he puzzled him just 
as much as the disciples were puzzled in the present 
instance. But when we turn to the record of subsequent 
events, and find how men got into the- church, we find 
how they were born again, and it is no longer a puzzle. 
Then, if we would know how this other apparent im- 



420 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

possibility was overcome by bim, with whom alone it 
was possible, why not turn to the record after the king- 
dom was fully established, and see how men of wealth 
secured their citizenship in it? If we discover how God 
overcame this difficulty, it will no longer be a difficulty 
to us, for Ave may see how it is to be overcome in all 
cases. Immediately after the preaching of Peter on the 
day of Pentecost, and the setting up of the church, 
as recorded in Acts ii, 44, 45, we find this difficulty 
reached and overcome — "And all that believed were 
together, and had all things common ; and sold their 
possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as 
every man had need/' Again in Acts iv. 34-37, we 
have another example of how the rich came into the 
kingdom ; and one striking example of an individual 
who sold all he had, and afterwards greatly distinguished 
himself as a preacher of the gospel. But let the Scrip- 
tures speak in their own words ; " Neither was there any 
among them that lacked ; for as many as were possessors 
of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of 
the things that were sold, and laid them down at the 
apostles' feet : and distribution was made unto every man 
according as he had need. And Joses, who by the apos- 
tles was surnamed Barnabas (which is, being interpreted, 
the son of consolation), a Levite, and of the country of 
Cyprus, having land, sold it, and brought the money, and 
laid it at the apostles' feet." Shall we carefully study 
and follow all the other examples furnished us by the 
primitive church, and wholly neglect this? Is it care- 
fully inserted twice by the Holy Spirit without any 
meaning or any usefulness to us ? Surely not. 

But, says one, Whose feet shall Avealth be laid at now? 
"Who is worthy of the trust? We do not mean that it 
shall be deposited with any one. There is no reason 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 421 

why wealth should not be held by the person who makes 
it, as one well qualified to hold and use it in the service 
of his Master; and this is, in truth, precisely what the 
apostle Peter directs shall be done — " As every man hath 
received the gift, even so minister the same one to an- 
other, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God" 
(1 Peter iv. 10). 

The proper care of our own person and of our 
children is as much serving Christ as any other good 
thing Ave may do ; and it must remain a question with 
every Christian to answer between his own conscience 
and his God, Hoav much may he devote to this work? 
How much does it require to make himself and those 
dependent upon him comfortable ? Christianity was not 
intended to make a man something else ; but to develop 
that which constitutes his true manhood, and bring all 
his powers into use in building up for himself and for 
others an imperishable treasure to be enjoyed through- 
out ceaseless ages. But to struggle and strive for the 
things of this world for the mere purpose of gratifying 
our own avarice, is to lay up treasure where moth and 
rust corrupt, and where thieves break through and 
steal. It is to expend all our efforts on things that 
pertain to the flesh, and to make no provision for that 
hour which is rapidly hastening on, when God shall say, 
" Thy soul is required of thee." 

And what, indeed, " does it profit a man if he gain 
the whole world and lose his own soul?" And the 
Saviour immediately adds, '^ For the Son of man shall 
come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and 
then he shall reward every man according to his works," 
not according to his worldly position. In order that 
we may know what this reward is, and who receives it, 
let us turn to where this same Jesus recounts to us more 



422 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

fully his coming, and the judgment, and we shall then 
see whether or not the view we have taken of this sub- 
ject is a correct one. (Matt. xxv. 31-46.) 

Thus we have the lesson complete ; we see how we 
may serve Christ on earth, and secure the glorious re- 
ward of everlasting life ; and how we may serve our 
own lusts, and bring upon ourselves everlasting condem- 
nation. The Saviour himself has finished the picture 
for us, and we behold in the strong language he em- 
ploys just how much it profits a man to gain the whole 
world and lose his own soul. 



SEBMONS AND ADDRESSES. 423 



MAN A COMPOUND BEING: CONNECTED TO 
THE NATURAL AND SPIRITUAL WORLD. 

"For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit 
do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live." — Eom. viii. 13. 

There are three words used in our language to describe 
a whole man — body, soul and spirit ; the Latin language 
has also three, and also the Greek, in which the New 
Testament was written. In all of the languages, the 
words corresponding to our words soul and spirit are 
used synonymously, that is, they are used as though they 
meant the same thing; as we sometimes say the soul of 
a man has gone to God who gave it, when we mean his 
spirit; and, I remember in my old Speller and Definer, 
soul is defined to mean spirit. This use of these two 
words has led many people to think that the inner man 
is composed of one part only, which is sometimes called 
the soul and sometimes the spirit. But this is a mistake, 
as we shall readily learn if we carefully examine the 
Scripture teaching in this respect. Paul, in his first let- 
ter to the Thessalonians, prays for them, that their 
whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless 
unto the coming of the Lord, thus most clearly distin- 
guishing between the soul and spirit. The author of the 
letter to the Hebrews says, "The word of God is quick 
and powerful, and shaper than any two-edged sword, 
piercing to the dividing asunder of the soul and spirit.'' 
And while this teaches us that it requires a very sharp 
instrument to divide between the soul and the spirit, it 



424 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

may, nevertheless, be done. The truth in regard to us 
is, that we are at the top of the physical creation, and at 
the bottom of the spiritual; on the one hand we are 
connected with all other spiritual life, and on the other 
hand we are connected with that sort of existence which 
the inhabitants of the upper world have. We are made 
out of the earth, and are earthy; but we are made in the 
image of God, and are spirits. Our likeness to God does 
not consist in our resemblance to him in body, for it is 
evident he has not a body in any respect. For "he is 
not far from every one of you; for in him we live, and 
move and have our being.'^ "For there is one God and 
Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you 
all.'^ Again the Psalmist says, "His presence filleth 
immensity.^' Again it is said, "Flesh and blood can not 
inherit the kingdom of God.'' " Neither doth corruption 
inherit incorruption.'' "And this <3orruptible must put 
on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immor- 
tality." And again we are taught that our earthly house 
of this tabernacle shall be dissolved, that we may have a 
building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal 
in the heavens. Indeed, throughout the Bible, and es- 
pecially throughout the New Testament, we are taught 
that the one great purpose to be accomplished with us 
is to get rid of our mortal bodies and get others that are 
immortal. Therefore our likeness to God is not in the 
flesh at all. For it is impossible that one whose pres- 
ence fills immensity should be cumbered with a body 
like ours, and our body is not even worthy of us; for it 
is spoken of as a mere tent, and much less should such 
a body be worthy of the eternal God. Our likeness to 
God, then, must consist in the fact that we have a spirit- 
ual nature, which, in its capacity for existence, is as 
limitless as the life of God. And is not the whole gos- 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 425 

pel founded on this idea — that man must exist through- 
out endless ages, whether in happiness supreme or in 
anguish indescribable? In our animal nature we are 
doomed, like all other animals, to dust; our existence is 
as transient as the flower that blooms in the meadow 
where the scythe of the mower shall lay it low. But in 
our higher nature there is an eternity before us, and 
whether Ave are to go on for evermore enjoying unspeakable 
pleasures and constantly increasing our capacity of hap- 
piness that we may more enjoy the love of God, or 
whether we are to wail in unimaginable anguish, it is an 
undoubted fact that the Bible teaches that there is an 
existence as unending as the existence of God. 

The soul of a man is that which corresponds to that 
of animal life, and is the connecting link between the 
spirit and the flesh ; and, when we consider the fact that 
we are not able to see the principle of life, and we are 
not able to trace out exactly how even our animal lives 
move and have their being, we can not wonder that the 
connection existing between the soul and spirit of a man 
should be still harder for us to trace. It all lies in a 
region unseen by mortal eyes, unhandled by mortal 
hands, and, in short, entirely beyond the range of the 
physical five senses. Therefore, for information on this 
subject, we must depend upon him who is a discerner 
of the thoughts and intents of the heart, who can see 
the workings of the soul and spirit even as we can see 
the movements of the body. And, just here, I would 
remark, how foolish for any man to measure God, in any 
of his attributes, by the capacities of men. For instance, 
to say when we are unable to discover a fact by the ex- 
ercise of all our powers, that there is no such fact. Now 
I will aflirm that the experience of all here will attest, 
that even we have intellectual powers which we are 
36 



426 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

entirely unable to exercise, simply because we have not 
organs of sufficient capacity. I can smell the odor aris- 
ing from a bed of fragrant flowers, and instantly my 
inner man decides that the odor is sweet. But our sense 
of smell is limited, and we can not gather in the sweet 
odors that are perfuming the air half a mile away 
from us, just simply for the reason that the external 
sense is exhausted. It is not the power within us which 
is no longer capable of comprehending the sweetness of 
the far-off perfume; for, if it had the sensation, from 
whatever distance, it would enjoy it as much as if it were 
near. Two persons might stand together in a wide 
prairie, bedecked with beautiful flowers which gratified 
the eye by their colors, and which filled the air with 
sweet perfume; but one of them has had the sense of 
smell destroyed by disease, and, although his companion 
is enjoying the flowers through two senses, he enjoys 
them with but one. But would he not be foolish to say 
that the flowers had no odor because he was incapable 
of enjoying it? And has the life within him any less 
power to appreciate a sweet smell than it had before the 
sense of smell in him had been lost? No, the life of a 
man — the real man which has the body for a house — is 
just the same as it was before disease had closed up 
one of the doors. But the door is shnt, and the man in 
the tabernacle groans, being burdened. But while they 
stand there among the flowers, a frightened deer bounds 
past, fleeing as for life ; and, as soon as it is out of sight, 
it is as completely lost to them as though it had no ex- 
istence. A quarter of an hour afterwards the baying of 
a hound is heard, and, swift as an arrow, with head 
down, and every nerve concentrated upon the work, the 
animal sweeps past on the trail of the deer, guided by 
an unerring sense which man can not exercise to that 



SERMOXS AND ADDRESSES. 427 

degree at all. Is the inner life of the dog better capa- 
ble of appreciating smells than the inner life of a man? 
No ; the difference is in the external organs of sense, 
and those of the dog are capable of taking up and 
conveying to the nerves within facts which exist, but 
which man's organs are not capable of laying hold of 
at all. 

Some people are deaf, and dumb and blind, and yet, 
with two doors of the earthly house closed, they are 
just as perfect in spirit as those who have all the doors 
open. It is true of every sense we have, that there is 
more beyond, which we would be capable of appreci- 
ating, if only our external senses were more powerful. 
And in conformity w^ith this we seek to increase the 
capacity of our external senses by exercise. Men who 
spend much of their lives upon the ocean learn to see 
farther than other men, and, indeed nearly all improve- 
ments that men make by practice at any thing are an 
increase of the power of the external organs. The inner 
life is residing in a house which only partially answers 
its desires ; there are five doors, and not one of them is 
wide enough to admit all that the tenant could desire to 
have admitted, and there are desires and longings which 
have neither door nor window through which ought of 
this would gratify. 

But, says some one, all these doors are possessed by 
brutes, and, so far, man does not differ in nature from 
them ; for, in common, they have the five physical senses. 
This is just the point to w^hich we desire to arrive, and 
our illustrations will serve a double purpose. In the 
first place, we ought to be taught by the fact that we 
have powers within which have no corresponding or- 
gan of sense ; that we can not measure even ourselves by 
our own senses, much less can we measure God. 



428 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

even fioite beings as we are, had a body perfectly fitted 
for the exercise of all the intellectual powers we have, 
what a world of new revelations would burst upon us ! 
What unth ought of knowledge would we obtain ! When 
the telescope was first employed to increase the capacity 
of the human eye, what vast increase was made of our 
knowledge of the heavens ! Now, God is a being who has 
no need of any such faculties as those we call senses. "All 
things are naked and open unto the eyes of him with 
whom we have to do/^ He sees all the universe; he is 
every -where present in it; the end and the beginning are 
alike to him, and he is positively uncircumscribed by 
any kind of obstacle in the exercise of powers limitless 
and boundless. Our own senses, multiplied by infinity, 
would furnish no standard by which to measure God, 
and how much less our senses in all their weakness and im- 
perfection. Therefore, for information upon questions re- 
lating to our eternal welfare, we must come to God himself 
as little children ; and, if he sees fit to give us information, 
it is well ; if he withholds information from us, it is well. 
Let all the earth keep silence when God is silent in his 
revelation to us, upon questions beyond our reach. 

What, then, does God reveal to us concerning the soul 
and spirit ? We have seen that the five physical senses 
w^hich brutes as well as men have, are the doors through 
which intelligence goes in and out to and from the life 
which is within. But right here we want to make a 
most important difference between men and mere animals. 
So far as we are able to judge, all the powers of the 
brute-life find full and complete exercise by the use of 
the organs of sense. A lamb skipping by the side of its 
dam, a horse roaming unrestrained over the wilds of nature, 
are filled to satiety, and there is no unsatisfied longing, 
and no unemployed po wer. But man's desires are absolutely 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 429 

insatiable by the exercise of the physical organs of sense. 
The farther he advances, the more he wants to advance; 
the more he enjoys, the more he Avants to enjoy. This 
fact, and a whole range of facts lying in this direction, 
were discovered and appreciated by the great men who 
constructed the Greek language; and while they were 
unable to find out an end for the powers, they saw clearly 
enough that there was a vast difference, in fact the intro- 
duction of an entirely different and new principle between 
the most exalted beast and the most degraded man. 
Therefore, they gave names to these different powers. 
They called that thing which man and animals both have — 
the principle of animal life — psuchee^ corresix)nding to 
our English word soul; and they called that other princi- 
ple which men have, and which brutes have not — pneuma, 
corresponding to our English word spirit. AVhen God 
came to address men on these subjects it was necessary 
that they should be spoken to in human language, using 
the Greek language, in which these two words already 
existed. God accepted the distinction betwe'en the soul, or 
animal life, and the spirit, though he meant to show 
fully what the distinction was, and what it meant, and 
what it made man capable of Any boy could see that 
there was a distinction between sandstone and limestone, 
though he could not tell what that distinction was. But 
a learned man who understood chemistry could use the 
names, which the boy already designated the two stones 
by^ in defining to him what the distinction really was. 
And farther, if there existed some things which a boy 
would not be able to comprehend, the learned man might 
not say any thing about them, but confine himself to such 
things as the boy could understand. Just so has God 
dealt with us. He found us possessed of a most wonder- 
ful language — the best adapted of any language that 



430 



JOHN PACKER mTCHELL. 



men ever had for the expression of spiritual truth. The 
Greeks had two words to define the inner man, and God 
used these two words, though he meant to reveal what no 
Greek had ever dreamed. He meant to lead men to a 
knowledge that there was in store for those who would 
love and obey God, a happiness and a glory so great that 
all the languages of earth broke down before even an 
outline of the blessed country was drawn. Eye hath not 
seen, ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the 
heart of man the things which God will give to them that 
love him. 

Most clearly, then, the Bible teaches that there is 
superadded to our animal life or soul a spiritual life, and 
we may settle down upon this fact as upon a sure founda- 
tion which God, and not man, has laid. In corroboration 
of this teaching, we have the fact without other light 
than that of nature. The Greeks had discovered the dis- 
tinction and given it names, though they were unable to 
push their inquiries farther. We are not able to separate 
each faculty of the soul and spirit so that we can put our 
finger on our inner nature and say " This is of the soul,'' 
and of another, " This is of the spirit." They are so 
closely united in all their manifestations that no eye but 
that of God is clear enough to separate between them. 
Therefore, there is no analysis of this kind attempted in 
the Bible, for if there had been, we could not have under- 
stood it. But if any one is disposed to indulge doubts 
because of this, we would just say you might as well 
indulge doubts about the animal life and the body in 
which it exists, for no surgeon is able to separate between 
life and its organ. If w^e take a knife and cut into the 
nerve of a living man, the nerve may be seen and ex- 
amined, and we may know that it is the organ of sensa- 
tion and motion ; but if we cut off the arm of a man, the 



SEmrONS AND ADDRESSES. 431 

nerves 'will be there in that arm, just as perfect under the 
knife and the microscope as in a living man, yet they 
have neither motion nor sensation. Why? No man can 
solve the question. Then if we can not clearly divide 
between the body, which we can see, and the soul, which 
we can not see, how could we be expected to divide be- 
tween soul and spirit, neither of which can be seen? We 
know of the difference between the soul or life, and the 
body by observation of the natural phenomena of life, in 
the very same way we know of a distinction between the 
soul and the spirit. There are phenomena, the most 
striking and wonderful, which can not be attributed to 
the existence of merely animal life in man, and so we 
know there is something else in us. God's word alone 
undertakes to tell us what that something else is, and 
what it is for. 

Now then, although we are not able clearly to separate 
between the soul and spirit, there are some things which 
are clearly taught of the spirit and not of the soul. The 
Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, is never in the Bible 
called the Holy Soul ; the same word is used for describ- 
ing our spirit that is used for describing the Spirit of 
God, though often the adjective Holy is prefixed when 
God's Spirit is meant, but never when man's spirit is 
meant. Secondly, our spirit does not depend upon a body 
or a soul for existence — it may, nay, it must, exist without 
either ; but it can never be happy without a house to live 
in. To be without a habitation is to be imperfectly 
happy. I have already stopped to prove so much that 
I must ask you to accept my statement, which I can 
easily prove, that the demons of the New Testament, 
which possessed men, and which Christ and the apostles 
sometimes cast out, were the spirits of wicked dead men. 
It will be remembered by all here, that to be cast out 



432 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

was direful punishment for those spirits; so that^ on one 
occasion, a legion of them besought Jesus to permit them 
to enter into swine rather than to have no habitation. 
It will be remembered, too, that when Lazarus the beggar 
died, he was carried to paradise. Jesus said: "In my 
Father's house are many mansions. I go to prepare 
a place for you.'' Paul said: "Not that we would be 
unclothed, but clothed upon." 

So far, then, as we are concerned we need no further 
information upon this subject than just such as will enable 
us to live for things of the Spirit, and not for those of 
the flesh. For clearly, if we live only for the flesh, we 
lose all when the flesh comes to lie and rot in the grave. 
We have an animal life, connecting us with animal exist- 
ence, and it is to follow the law of all animal life. It is 
to die, to cease to be forever. But we have a spiritual 
life, connecting us with the existence of God, and it is to 
last as long as the life of God. 

We discover that by the employment of our physical 
senses we come down into contact with the physical 
world, and exercise the faculties of our animal life. 
Now, by faith, we may rise into the spiritual world, 
and live with God and his Son Jesus Christ, and with 
the spirits of just men made perfect; for truly, as John 
says, " Our fellowship is with the Father and with 
his Son Jesus Christ." And when our faith is fixed on 
Jesus and on the truths of God's word, our being has an 
end, for it is worthy of all our lofty powers and worthy 
of the great God who made us. We find happiness in 
life by walking by faith, and have no more to possibly 
desire than those things we hope for at the coming of 
our blessed Saviour. Faith belongs to the spirit, and 
nothing having animal life has it except man. We use 
it to rise upward to the contemplation of God and 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 433 

neaven, just as we use our senses to come down to a 
contemplation of the physical world. God be praised 
*for evermore that he has made us what we are, that we 
may walk together with him, each one of us, in pre- 
paring a pure and immortal spirit for a glorified and im- 
mortal body, which it shall receive when all them that 
sleep in Jesus shall God bring with him. 

Brethren, what shall we do in consideration of these 
things? Shall we give nearly all of our time in gathering 
together of the things that please and gratify the animal 
soul, or shall we cultivate and develop the spirit ? Oh, 
my beloved brethren ! we are not living as we ought to 
live, and we are not producing upon our fellow-men the 
effect we ought to produce. There are many professed 
Christians who can think of nothing they have done in 
walking after the Spirit, except to make a profession. We 
have had a meeting every AVednesday evening all winter, 
especially for devotional and spiritual exercises, and how 
few have been our numbers. I tell you, the flesh lusteth 
against the spirit, and the spirit warreth against the flesh ; 
and I warn you all solemnly before God, that ^' if ye live 
after the flesh ye shall die ; '^ but, " if ye through the 
spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.'' 

What are we all about? Do we not know that all the 
flowers of earthly pleasure that we pluck from the soil 
are blooming over graves? that the very leaves and 
stems are made of dust that once bloomed with life or 
burned with passion ? Are we not standing on the shore 
of a boundless ocean, where waves are lashing from be- 
neath our feet the sands of time on which our feet are 
placed? Shall we then seek after the pleasures of this 
world which end only in death? or shall we not reach by 
faith clear over the heaving ocean, and lay hold on eter- 
nal life and pleasures which will never fade ? 
37 



434 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

Here we are all crowded on the beach, and one by one 
we are passing over. As the spirits of our loved ones take 
their flight, we turn to lay their cold forms in the grave, 
and the voice of the great deep of eternity calls and calls, 
and we interpret its voice into a warning to us all that 
we must die. Let us prepare for death with more care 
than for this poor life; for we shall ^^want but little here 
below, nor w^ant that little long." Over there we shall 
want much, and we shall want it for evermore. Let us 
study the character of Jesus, let us imitate his life, let us 
follow his teaching, that his Spirit may testify with our 
spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then 
heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ. And oh ! my 
friends, you who have proposed to walk after the Spirit, 
will you not begin to-day? Will you not join hands 
with us and help us, as we will help you to follow Jesus 
Christ? Why should you stand, idle? Are there no 
warnings? Is not the world full of graves, and all the 
air full of death ? Have there been no dark shadows in 
your households ? Have there been no marble brows, and 
dimmed eyes, and icy forms carried from the circle of 
your dear ones ? Ah ! I know you have all lost dear 
ones who have gone away from earth. As years roll 
around with us, and we turn to count those who were 
with us in the morning of life and those who are around 
us now, we find that we have more friends in heaven 
than we have on earth. I plead with you in the 
name of our Lord Jesus Christ to go with us and join 
them. 

Ye who have mourned when the spring flowers were taken, 
When the ripe fruit fell richly to the ground, 
When the loved slept, in brighter homes, to waken 
Where their pale brows with spirit wreaths are crowned. 
Large are the mansions in our Father's dwelling, 



It 



SER3fONS AND ADDRESSES. 435 

Glad are the homes that sorrows never dim, 
Soft are the tones that raise the heavenly hymn, 
There like an Eden, blooming in gladness, 
Bloom the fair flowers the earth too rudely pressed ; 
Come unto Jesus, ye who droop in sadness, 
Come nnto him, and he will give you rest. 



436 JOBN PACKER MITCHELL, 



THE DEATH OF CHKIST. 

{Discourse delivered in Atlanta, III,, Sunday, June 6, 1869.] 

"I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive forever- 
more, Amen ; and have the keys of hell and of death." — Kev. i. 18. 

As the prime purpose of our assembling here this 
morning is to engage in keeping an institution which 
commemorates the death of him in whose name we are 
organized, I propose, during the few minutes that I shall 
address you, to look into some of the details of that death, 
and to. endeavor to discover the importance of the event 
we celebrate. 

What a strange spectacle we present to the Avorld in 
thus keeping perpetually in memory the fact that our 
Lord, our Master, our Leader, the founder of our relig- 
ion, the Author and Finisher of our faith, met with an 
ignominious death, having been executed in a manner 
only employed for the execution of the worst criminals 
and lowest beings in society. Has any thing like it ever 
before been witnessed on earth ? Would the idea of 
erecting such an institution ever have been conceived in 
the mind of any human being? Suppose that among 
some of us, in tracing our genealogy back generations, we 
discover that one of our ancestors has been hung, would 
we think of proclaiming the fact to others ? Would we 
not carefully conceal the record, and desire that no one 
should know the disgrace our family had suffered? And 
suppose, further, that we had secured immense wealth by 
the disgraceful death of one of our progenitors, which we 



SER3I0NS AND ADDRESSES. 437 

were daily enjoying ourselves and bestowing on onr fel- 
low-men, would Ave be inclined to inform the world of 
our shame? Would we not rather seek to create the im- 
pression that both his death and his life were such as men 
desire, and secure respect for our ancestor as well for his 
personal position in society as for the wealth he bestowed? 
There can be but one answer to each of these questions. 
It is human, it is natural, that we should seek not only to 
secure the respect of our fellow-meu for ourselves, but 
also for our ancestors. It is because it is not human, it is 
not natural, that the institution we keep assumes an im- 
portance to us and to the world, which we can never fully 
understand until he "who was dead and is alive,'' comes 
again in glory to receive those who have believed in and 
obeyed him. Every first day morning we present to 
mankind the strange spectacle of one who was put to 
death between two thieves on a Roman cross — the most 
disgraceful means of destroying life that Roman ingenuity 
could devise ; and stranger still, we actually blend with 
our devotions an institution which puts us in memory of 
this shame, and thus, contrary to all human notions on 
the subject, we glory in our shame. Since the mind of 
man could never have conceived such an idea of itself, 
and since human pride, if left to itself, could forever have 
repudiated it, it follows that we must have received it 
from God. Xo more triumphant and irrefutable proof 
proves that fact, which constitutes the foundation of Chris- 
tian faith — that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the 
living God — exists than this, that one in the form of a 
man, subject to all the feelings and desires of any other 
human being, should foresee and foretell his own disgrace- 
ful death, and with his own hand break the loaf which 
was for all time to be an emblem of his broken body ; 
that he should hand to his chosen apostles the cup which 



438 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

contained the wine, which was to be emblematical of his 
shed blood to the end of the world. 

It is not altogether without parallel in the history of 
man, that one should adhere to his purpose even unto 
death, and those who do not love our Lord Jesus Christ 
can point out a few instances in which this actually oc- 
curred. But that the death should not only be voluntary 
and deliberately worked up through a period of consid- 
erable length, that it should be told by him who was to 
suffer, and made by him an essential — in fact, the essential 
— part of the work of founding a new religion, is alto- 
gether without parallel in history, and must remain so for- 
ever. If Christ had been a mere man, possessed of ex- 
traordinary power as a man, and desirous of establishing 
a religious system which should perpetuate his name and 
his virtues forever, the thought might be conceived, that 
having once committed himself to the work, and having 
alleged that he was the Jewish Messiah, the Son of God, 
he should seal the allegation with an oath before the 
high priest of his nation and die for the confession; but 
that from the hour in which his work on earth began, 
he should make the awful death he suffered a prominent 
feature in his religion, and the great fact upon which 
the whole system turns, and that he should deliberately 
and voluntarily go into the city of Jerusalem to be de- 
livered to those who .thirsted for his blood, and there, 
before any difficulty had occurred, establish the institu- 
tion we keep to this day to commemorate his death, can 
be accounted for by no human being on any other hy- 
pothesis than that he is the Christ, the Son of the living 
God. No enemy of our religion can deny, in the face 
of history, that Jesus of Nazareth was possessed of most 
extraordinary powers. It is plain to all that if self-ag- 
grandizement had been his object, if the establishment 



SEE3fONS AND ADDRESSES, 439 

of a structure of mere earthly governmeut which should 
fill the whole earth with the fame and terror of his 
name and power, and with veneration and respect for 
his transcendent virtues had been his object, it would 
have been necessary only for him to employ that power 
by which he controlled whatever he desired to control, 
and all mankind could not have successfully resisted 
him. What human strength could have availed against 
him, who spake to the raging waves of the sea and they 
grew calm, who healed incurable diseases with a word, 
who cast out demons, who drove crowds of men with a 
scourge of small cords, who walked upon the waters, 
who transported himself through space at his will, who 
called back the departed spirits to its deserted tenement, 
and who exercised unlimited authority over all that man 
fears or leans upon for defense ? Nothing would have 
been easier than for one who was master of such power 
— whether God or man — than to have overturned the 
Empire of Rome, and, with a thousand fold more glory 
than Solomon, have swayed the scepter of David over a 
submissive w^orld. But, so far from doing any thing like 
this, we find that he never employed his wonderful 
power merely for his own good. So far as his own 
power was concerned, he appeared among men always 
the humble, gentle, unassuming son of Mary, wife of 
Joseph, the carpenter. Often hungry, often sad, exposed 
to all the elements as other men were, foot-sore and 
weary, he journeyed from place to place throughout his 
native country, employing his power for the good of 
others while he had no place to lay his head. Whoever 
alleges, in view of these facts, that Jesus was a mere 
man, attributes to man what no human being ever ex- 
hibited in his life or conceived in his heart; and, by 
such an assumption, transfers to man that power which 



440 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 



we attribute to God only. With faith too weak to con- 
fess that Jesus is God, and yet so strong as to believe 
that such works as his are within the power of man, 
what an anomaly • an infidel is ! Thus we see, that 
in attending to this institution, we say to all who' are 
our witnesses, in most emphatic terms, Jesus is the 
Christ, the Son of the eternal God. 

One other great purpose is served by keeping this in- 
stitution. We find in the history of the past, reaching 
back to the fall of man, that God never intrusted the 
great facts, upon which redemption from sin was based, to 
human language alone. All languages are subject to 
changes, and, to free us from all doubt and. difficulty 
arising out of this fact, our heavenly Father has em- 
ployed agencies which never change. Before the appear- 
ance of his Son in the flesh, innumerable types had pre- 
figured and presignified the nature of the structure he 
would rear; and thus Avere written in unchangeable char- 
acters the facts which mere language might have failed 
clearly and fully to reveal. The Lord's supper answers ^ 
a similar purpose. We attend to it to-day, and no in- 
fidel can point out to us a time in the history of the 
past 1800 years when it was not attended to. No other 
fact is better established than this; and, if we had no 
inspired word to teach us in another way, this institution 
would lead us on to the facts on which it is predicated. 
It is monumental in its character, and appeals to the 
mind in attestation of the truth on which it is based as 
powerfully as the celebration of the fourth of July does 
to the truth of the fact which it commemorates. If a 
stranger, who knew nothing of the history of the Amer- 
ican republic, should come among us and witness the joy 
and enthusiasm with which we annually celebrate the 
fourth of July, and inquire the reason, wHat little child 



SEBMONS AND ADDBESSES. 441 

is there among us that could not tell him we were keep- 
ing in memory the famous deed our fathers did in the 
old State House in Philadelphia, on the fourth day of 
July, 1776? There would be no need of appeals to 
written history to convince that man that the event we 
were celebrating had actually occurred. The truth would 
strike his mind with tenfold more force in view of the 
facts before him. If the system of government our 
fathers framed should last to the end of time, and we 
annually attended to this celebration, no flight of years 
nor change of language could ever affect the force with 
which it would forever teach the first great fact in our 
history. Only the other day, the people all over this 
land went out with the sweetest and most beautiful 
flowers, and bedecked the graves of those brave, true 
men who fell in the recent great struggle for union. 
Could the historian's pen or the sculptor's chisel trace 
in more intelligible characters the historic fact that those 
who slumber beneath the flowers, which loving hands 
have strewn above their dust, sacrificed their lives at the 
call of their country? And if this custom should con- 
tinue for ages, our descendants would need no Avritten 
history to inform them of the merits and the fame of 
the fallen. And if no pen ever traced the story of their 
services, what enemy of theirs in the future could ever 
induce our children to believe that the custom of beauti- 
fying their last resting places had originated from 
nothing. 

Now we find that this ordinance of the Lord's house 
has been kept regularly an-d statedly for 1800 years, and 
that it has been handed down from generation to genera- 
tion for the purpose of commemorating something. If 
it does not commemorate our Lord's death, it has no 
meaning at all, and we are driven to the conclusion that 



442 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



it is founded upon nothing. But such a conclusion is 
contrary to all human experience, and can not be admitted. 
Therefore, no rational man can deny that he whose death 
it commemorates was actually dead. If dead, then the 
same institution is proof positive of his resurrection. 
For it is perfectly evident that those who followed the 
Saviour while he was on earth w^ere led to do so from his 
many virtues and from the many exhibitions he gave of 
his power over the physical and spiritual world. And 
w^hrle they undoubtedly expected him to employ this 
power for the establishment of either a government or a 
religion, or both together, in which they would occupy 
prominent positions, they had no proper conception of 
the nature of that which he did establish until after his 
ascension into heaven. And they had not the remotest 
idea that his own ignominious death was to be an impor- 
tant part of the work. Accordingly, after this event 
occurred, we find them, as was perfectly natural, dis- 
heartened, discouraged, humiliated, and about to return 
heavy-hearted to their ordinary avocations. After the 
grave had actually held the body of the crucified Jesus, 
he would not have had a follower, and in a very short 
time his name would have been preserved only by a few 
lines on the page of history. No doubt those who had 
been personally and intimately acquainted with him, wit- 
nessing his virtues and labors, would often have shed a tear 
to his memory, and lamented his melancholy fate. But that 
is all. The idea that a band of unlettered and uncultivated 
men, headed by one who had been terrified into a denial 
of Christ even during his life by the words of a damsel, 
organizing a Church against the fiercest opposition of 
those who had crucified their Leader, and that too in the 
same city where his death had occurred, unless his resur- 
rection actually took place, is too absurd to obtain a 



SEB3I0NS AND ADDRESSES. 443 

moment's thought from any sensible man. But such a 
church has actually existed for more than eighteen centuries, 
and always prominent among its ordinances, however 
greatly other things may have been perverted, we find 
this strange custom of perpetuating a crucifixion. So, 
that without any evidence from the Scriptures, we defy 
any man on earth to account for the facts in the case, in 
any rational way, who denies that Jesus died and rose 
again from the dead. Any one who undertakes it will 
find himself once more driven to fix his faith upon that 
which is hardest to believe. For he can not consistently 
deny the divinity of Jesus without giving to a band of 
illiterate men, with a Galilean fisherman at their head, the 
power which we attribute to God. And thus, these sim- 
ple emblems — the bread and the wine — and the use we 
make of them, form of themselves a barrier as impregna- 
ble as the pillars of heaven against the assaults of all 
who would subvert our religion at its foundation, by 
denying that Jesus is the Christ the Son of the living 
God. 

The words we have chosen, upon w^hich to predicate 
some remarks, announce two grand facts of greater in- 
terest to those who seek salvation and eternal life, than 
all other facts in the universe: ^^ Behold I am alive 
for evermore, and have the keys of hell and of death.'' 
That Christ died and rose again from among the dead, 
would be a matter of little interest to us if we had not 
some way of connecting ourselves with him, and of secur- 
ing something in our own persons as the fruit of his 
victory. It would no doubt be a source of pleasure and 
joy to us, that so pure, lovely and virtuous a person, 
when put to death by wicked and impure hands, had 
burst the bars of death and triumphed gloriously over all 
his foes. It would be a source of great gratification to us 



444 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



to know that the adorable Son of God, who took upon 
himself the form of a servant, and lived the life of a 
human being in the flesh, doing deeds of kindness to our 
race, had ascended in transcendent glory to the home 
from whence he came, and taken his seat at the right 
hand of the Majesty on high. But it would be that sort 
of pleasure we feel in the triumph of another. Unless 
we could derive some benefit to ourselves from the great 
facts concerning Christ, it would scarcely be worth our 
while to learn them. But, when we take into considera- 
tion the fact that his victory w^as our victory, that all he 
undertook and suffered and accomplished was for our 
benefit and not for his ; how glorious a thing it becomes 
for us to stand with the Apostle John on the isle of Pat- 
mo s, and see with the eye of faith, as he saw in the 
apocalyptic vision, "Him that liveth and was dead, and 
is alive for evermore,^' and know that he has secured and 
now holds the keys to the dominions of the dread de- 
stroyer of our race ! In the first place, let us analyze the 
language of the Scripture before us : What is meant by 
having the keys of death and of hell? The word here 
translated hell in the common version, is not in the 
original the word which w^as employed to describe the 
place of future torment of the wicked, but is the word 
hadeSj and literally means the unseen. It was used by 
the NcAV Testament writers, as the name of the abode of 
the dead, the place of departed spirits, into which all 
spirits enter when they leave the body, whether they 
have done good or evil. Christ then possesses the keys 
of this unseen realm, and exercises control over it. But 
it says he also has the keys of death. We understand by 
this, that when he achieved victory over death, he ob- 
tained absolute and eternal control over that remorseless 
monster who had brought to the grave unnumbered mill- 



SEBMONS AND ADDRESSES. 445 

ions of the race of man. Since then, Death exercises his 
office only by the will of Christ, and from having been a 
resistless conqueror he is made a subservient slave. We 
perceive, then, by this vision, that Jesus Christ has abso- 
lute power over death and his unseen realm, and are 
prepared to realize that he is able to fulfill his own say- 
ing uttered while yet on earth, "That every one which 
seeth the Son, and belie veth on him, may have everlast- 
ing life: and I will raise him up at the last day" (John 
vi. 40). If the eating of the Lord^s supper were merely 
a celebration of his death, we might suspend further 
inquiry on the subject right here; for when we celebrate 
his death, we celebrate also his glorious resurrection from 
the grave, and by faith we see him seated on the right 
hand of his Father, ready and willing to give eternal life 
to all that believe on and obey him. But when he had 
given thanks he gave bread to his disciples and said: 
"This is my body, which is given for you: this do in 
remembrance of me" (Luke xxii. 19). There is there- 
fore, at least two purposes to be served by the keeping of 
this ordinance : The one is intended more particularly 
for the eyes of the world, that the claims of Christ may 
be continually presented to them by the medium of sight 
as well as by hearing; the other is intended for us — for 
those who have put on Christ — that we may keep in 
memory the blessed Lord who loved us and gave him- 
self for us. There is, then, some thing for us to re- 
member; and as we glance at the work of Jesus, at 
what he did and suffered for us, we get a view of the man- 
ner in which he obtained possession of the keys of hell 
and of death. We have seen the mighty spoil he holds 
in his hand as the result of victory; let us look at 
the tremendous and terrific struggle by which he tri- 
umphed. 



446 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



We behold him first in the " Palace Eoyal of the 
Universe/' in the immediate presence of the eternal 
God, his Father: "In the beginning was the Word'' 
(John i. 1). What a vast eternity of thought rushes 
upon us when we read this sentence! We are trans- 
ported at once into a region where all about us is sur- 
rounded by the eternity of the past. When primeval 
night reigned supreme where the worlds and suns of 
the universe now roll and shine; before the voice of 
God had quickened the womb of chaos and began the 
work of creation ; before the waves of time had yet 
begun to roll ; " when space was shoreless or else 
unborn;" and in the midst of things which were and 
are eternal, we first gain a knowledge of our Lord. 
The mind of man, with all its wondrous powers, fails 
to traverse- the unmeasured depths; the imagination 
itself, quicker than the winged lightning, sinks on 
wearied wings; and the Spirit of the eternal only can 
make the journey, and inspire the apostle to tell us 
of things at the " beginning." But under the teaching 
of inspiration, we there behold him " Who, being in the 
form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with 
God " (Philippians ii. 6) ; for the record adds, " And the 
Word was God. We first behold the Word, "which was 
made flesh and dwelt among us," possessed of that 
power which enabled him to make all things ; for all 
things were made by him and for him. How won- 
derful, how inexhaustible the love that prompted him 
to lay aside all his honors and take upon himself the 
form of a servant that we might have life and share 
in his glories! 

Except prophecies concerning a Messiah — vailed in 
figurative language, and not intended to be understood 
until after their fulfillment — the inspired record tells us 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 447 

nothing more of him from this period until we behold 
him in the form of a little babe, born of a woman, and 
laid in a manger in the humble town of Bethlehem. 
And what a scene it is upon which we are permitted to 
gaze ! The Son of the great God, by whom the universe 
was made, clothed in the form of a wxak and powerless 
infant, and laid in an oxen's manger, because there was 
no room at the inn. No room for him! Oh! how sub- 
limely does the love of God shine forth in this one 
sentence. Man was sunk in sin and degradation, and 
subject to the dominion of Satan and death. Without 
power to do any thing for himself, generation after gen- 
eration was hurried to the tomb, and man seemed hope- 
lessly doomed to a short and troubled life, and an eternal 
death. Jehovah stretched forth his arm to help, and his 
own Son appeared in the flesh to redeem the human 
race from sin, and give them eternal life. With the 
whole universe as his patrimony, he appeared in an 
obscure town of earth, and there is no room found for 
him in the inn — only among the beasts of the stall. 
While yet in the years of tender infancy, the wicked 
sword of Herod seeks his life ; and, driven forth from 
his own land, he is borne about the world. Once more 
he almost disappears from view, and but little is known 
of him until he appears in the full stature of manhood 
on the banks of the Jordan and demands baptism of 
one who was there baptizing. Having been baptized, 
the heavens open, the Holy Spirit in visible form de- 
scends upon him, and the voice of God proclaims: 
'^This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. '^ 
Then, guided by the Spirit, he goes into the wilderness 
and engages in personal combat with Satan, and inau- 
gurates the work which is utterly to overturn his em- 
pire, by a signal triumph over the arch-enemy of our 



448 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

race and of God. But what a work it was that lay- 
before him ! Seeking nothing for himself; gratifying 
none of the human feelings which he possessed as much 
as any son of Adam; often weary, hungry and sorrowful, 
he went about doing good to men, and preparing the 
world to receive the priceless gift he came from heaven 
to bestow. Who can read the simple and beautiful 
record the inspired penmen have given us concerning 
Jesus of Nazareth and not love him? Healing the sick, 
restoring sight to the blind, weeping at the scene of 
human suffering, raising the dead, preaching to the poor, 
loving all men, possessing limitless power — and using it 
freely for others, but never for himself — what hero of 
romance, for whose imaginary doings and sufferings 
weak mortals weep, ever presented to the human heart 
so much to love, so much to admire, so much to stir 
the inmost depths of the soul? Only once during his 
life do we see him any thing more than a poor, suffering, 
toiling, weary, heavily burdened Son of man. Once, 
accompanied by three of his disciples, he toils up a 
mountain of Judea, and there his glory breaks forth, 
and he appears what he indeed is — God manifest in the 
flesh. Perceiving that his followers failed to compre- 
hend the nature of the work in which he was engaged, 
in order to give them confidence to sustain them 
through the fiery trial which was soon to test their 
faith, and, perhaps, to accomplish something which we 
do not understand, he is transfigured before them; and 
they look in rapture and awe upon the specimen 
he presents to their gaze of the glories that shall 
surround the presence of the subjects of the kingdom 
his work is to establish. But even when arrayed in 
garments of living light, and covered with the glories 
which by right are his, he talks with the two glo- 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES 449 

rified persons, who appear with him, of his approaching 
decease (Luke ix). And coming down from the mount, 
he becomes again the same lovely, sinless, humble and 
toiling Son of man — simply Jesus of Nazareth, Son of 
Mary. 

How shall we depict that scene into which his weary 
journeyings up and down the earth are about to conduct 
him? or how shall the mind of man ever realize the 
tremendous fact before which the universe shudders to 
its center? Many persons see nothing in the death of 
Christ but a simple falling into the hands of a cruel and 
excited mob, a mock trial and crucifixion. They see 
him die as other men die, because, being powerless to 
escape from the cruel hands into which he had fallen, 
they killed him ! But those who take such a view of 
this most tragic scene of which men or angels ever 
gazed upon, lose sight of the heaviest part of the bur- 
den which Christ bore for us. By the light of revela- 
tion, let us follow him to the cross and to the tomb, 
and see if there was not something more than a simple 
yielding to fate on the part of this Lamb led to the 
slaughter. The simple fact that he went voluntarily to 
Jerusalem and put himself into the hands of his enemies, 
is all that many see as an act far above any thing of 
which any merely human being was ever capable ; and 
this, of itself, would indeed be enough to fill our whole 
hearts with love and admiration. But we must remem- 
ber that throughout all the scenes through which he 
passed, he had the ability at any time to assei't his 
power as a God, and bring summary vengeance upon 
the heads of his enemies. In his own language, he 
could pray to the Father and bring to his rescue more 
than twelve legions of angels. And the fact that he 
subjected the desires of the flesh in this last trying hour, 
38 



450 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



is one of the most stupendous connected with his sojourn 
on earth. It must ever be borne in mind, that though 
he was the Son of God, he had a human body subject to 
like impulses as our own, and that his sufferings and 
trials were precisely of the same nature to him they 
would have been to us. The ability that he possessed 
of escaping at any time from the foes that thronged 
around him, of visiting upon them the wath of God, was 
only an additional trial. A mere man, under the circum- 
stances, could do nothing else but die, and would have 
no such additional and indescribable torture, but that of 
submitting voluntarily to outrage, wrong and death which 
he might easily prevent. Bearing this important fact in 
mind, let us contemplate, for a moment, the last scenes 
in that grand life, and that wonderful death which se- 
cured for us eternal life. 

After instituting that ordinance which was ever after- 
wards to commemorate his death, the historian tells us 
they went out into the garden of Gethsemane, on the 
mount of Olives. Oh ! that ever soul of man could look 
with appreciating eye on the scene which transpired in 
that garden ! Surely it was enough to melt the heart of 
the most hardened sinner, and lead him to the feet of that 
man of sorrows. How many of us have looked upon one 
convicted of sin, and agonized under the fearful burden 
from which he has learned no way of escape? How 
many of us have seen men at the very gates of death, 
loaded down with sin which it is too late to cast off, and 
writhing in an agony most fearful to look upon? All 
who have witnessed such horrors know there is no 
earthly anguish with which it can be compared. If 
escape is not afforded it racks the soul and unhinges the 
mind of man. The torture of the spirit is greater than 
human flesh can bear. Then behold this pure and sinless 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 451- 

One, who all his life had wrought works of mercy only, 
and of love, alone in the garden, withdrawn even from his 
own disciples, agonizing, not merely under the sins of 
one, but having laid upon him the sins of the whole race 
of man. Does any one suppose that he could bear it 
with any less suffering than we? Then see him sweat 
great drops of blood, and with all the strength of his 
perfect human nature, it became necessary for an angel 
from heaven should come and strengthen him. Until we 
meet him in the eternal kingdom, and receive bodies like 
unto his glorious body, we can never understand fully the 
awful accumulation of agony he bore in that fearful 
hour. And while he was yet in the garden, a multitude 
of brutal men, led by one of his own followers, appears to 
seize him and lead him to new horrors which lie before 
him. But we forbear to trace his progress step by step 
through all the miseries he felt. Dragged through the 
streets of Jerusalem, first to the palace of the high 
priest, then to that of Pilate, the Roman governor; 
beaten with scourges, buffeted by the hands of slaves, 
spit upon, reviled, cursed, mocked all night long and 
until nine o'clock next day, was the pure and lovely 
Saviour the victim of that cruel mob ; and when he 
looked upon his disciples — that little band of men who 
had followed him through all his journeyings — and 
thought of the anguish which must rend their hearts 
when they saw their Master, whom they "trusted would 
have redeemed Israel,^' thus powerless, submissive, and 
led to death, what a weight of woe must have fallen upon 
him ! Though they had often been told he must suffer, 
they had utterly failed to understand the significance of 
the saying, "With his life went out all their hopes, and in 
sorrow and despair they must turn away from the cruci- 
fied body of their beloved Lord. Who can imagine the 



452 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

feelings of the blessed Saviour under these reflections ! 
But it was as if all that can possibly strengthen or encour- 
age the human mind in the hour of death was withdrawn 
from him; his disciples Avandering, stricken, scattered, 
without their leader, tormented by the scorn of their fel- 
low-men for their devotion to an impostor ; his mother's 
soul pierced through with a sword, with no friend to 
cheer or comfort, with the sins of the whole human fam- 
ily heaped upon him, he went out to the place of cruci- 
fixion, bearing his own cross, amidst the hate, and scorn, 
and peltings of the mad and wicked mob which sought 
his life. Upon reaching Calvary, what a scene occurred ! 
No wonder the earth shuddered, no wonder the sun 
draped himself in black, no wonder nature w^as convulsed 
when that stupendous scene was enacted — when wicked 
hands crucified and murdered the adorable Redeemer! 
It is easier, perhaps, for us to understand the physical 
torture he endured than the mental. The agonies of his 
great soul, which led him to cry out, My God ! My God ! 
why hast thou forsaken me ? in the depths of utter misery 
and woe far outstretch our capacity. But fastened upon 
a hard and cruel cross, by nails driven through the most 
sensitive parts of the body, which hung with its whole 
weight upon it, what greater physical torture could 
hellish ingenuity devise? Thousands declare that they 
believe the facts of the Christian religion, w^hile at the 
same time they make no effort to obey the gospel. Can 
we credit their declaration? Do they really believe what 
they profess? Can they look upon this scene wdth the 
eye of faith, fully realizing that it is not an imaginary 
picture, and know that Jesus was enduring all for them, 
and yet turn away and refuse to do any thing in obedi- 
ence to him ? Can they see the Son of God stripped of 
all his raiment, nailed to a cross, and left exposed to all 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 453 

the shame and agony of such a position for six dreadful 
hours, and believe that, unless they accept him for their 
king they are guilty of his blood, and yet refuse? Can 
they see him endure all this physical torture, and know 
that, in addition to it, the sins of the whole human fam- 
ily were heaped upon him, and yet turn away? Believ- 
ing that he bore their sins in his own body on the cross, 
can they deliberately resolve to snatch them back from 
him to bear them for themselves in hell ? In charity, let 
us say, they do n't believe what they think they do. 

At three o'clock in the afternoon, on the sixth day of 
the week, over eighteen hundred years ago, the great 
tragedy was finished. The powers of hell had done their 
worst. For four thousand years Satan had held the hu- 
man race in bondage, "through fear of death," and now 
he had brought to the dust in which slumbered the 
millions that composed more than one hundred and twenty 
generations of men. The body of the Son of God, the 
glorious head was bowed, the pure heart had ceased to 
throb, the tenderly sympathetic bosom no longer heaved, 
and Jesus, the friend of all mankind, was dead. What 
shouts of demon triumph must have echoed through the 
vaults of the unseen, when he, who had called from them 
the spirits of others, hi-mself entered as a chained captive! 
How Satan must have triumphed in the thought that 
heaven's power was overthrown, and his own dominion 
secured forever! How shall we ever know what the work 
of Jesus was in that unseen world, while the body slum- 
bered in the tomb of Joseph ? ^yhat spiritual warfare did 
he carry on in the realms of Satan and death in order to 
secure the keys which he now held forever? These 
things we can never understand until we enter that realm 
wherein the victory was achieved. But there is some- 
thing we can appreciate. We can understand that, hav- 



454 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

ing secured the keys, the victim became tne master, and 
that, triumphing gloriously over hell and death, his spirit 
returned to the cold body in the tomb,, and Jesus came 
forth from the guarded sepulcher to comfort, cheer, and 
strengthen his little band of sorrowing disciples. All 
these things we are to keep in memory, and one other 
great event which secured to us for all eternity a share in 
the glorious victory of our Lord Jesus Christ — his en- 
trance with the great sacrifice into the holy of holies, 
even into heaven itself, and his sanctification there as our 
High Priest forever. Having remained with his disciples 
forty days, and convincing them by many infallible 
proofs that he was the veritable person who had been 
three days in the grave, he was parted from them and 
received up into heaven, amid the glories he had with 
the Father before the world was. But what an addi- 
tional interest there is for us in looking upon him now. 
Then he was all divinity and altogether unapproachable 
by man. Now he wears a human body which was borne 
about the world, lacerated on the cross, and silent in the 
grave. By faith w^e see that wondrous sight which thrills 
us with love and joy, and fills our hearts with hopes of 
immortality and bliss. If angels gazed at man in the 
image of God, in the person of the first Adam; in what 
wonder and transport ought we to behold the sight of 
man in the person of the second Adam, upon the throne 
of the everlasting God ! How our hearts thrill with de- 
light and hopes of immortality, when we reflect that the 
glorified and exalted Christ has not only made it possible 
for us to come and be like him; but that he pleads with 
all the race of man to come and be like him ! that he has 
not only prepared a way for us to come, but that he re- 
mains our High Priest and Mediator forever, ready to ap- 
pear in the presence of God for us ! 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 455 

That we may never forget nor wander from him, but 
dying daily to sin, stand ever ready to have him take 
us by the hand and safely lead us through the dark do- 
main of which he forever holds the keys, is my prayer, 
for the Redeemer's sake. Amen, 



456 



JOHN PACKEB MITCHELL. 



JESUS THE WAY, THE TEUTH, AND THE 

LIFE. 



" I am the way, the truth, and the life." — John xiv. 

One of the strongest proofs of Christianity known to 
me is, that it has survived the friendship of so many 
who have presented it to the world distorted and dis- 
figured, and made it as hateful as it is possible to make 
any thing which has such intrinsic loveliness. "What 
mighty power there must be in the gospel, when, amidst 
all the doctrines and philosophies of men, half obscured 
by creeds and theological systems, half presented to the 
world by men who have ecclesiastical machinery to take 
care of, it still bears to man a sweet and pleasing voice, 
which millions can not resist, saying : ^' Come unto me, 
and I will give you rest." The author of the Christian 
religion was a poor and humble Nazarene. Its first 
propagators were uncultivated fishermen. It went forth 
against religious systems many centuries old ; it con- 
tended against the imposing ceremonies of the temple 
and synagogue worship of the Jews; it entered the 
splendid temples of heathenism and, surrounded by all 
the grand and beautiful works of which human genius 
was capable, it gazed with eye undazzled on the gold, 
silver and precious stones, the magnificent statuary and 
gorgeous paintings, and, in the name of the living God, 
condemned them all. It pronounced the doom of all 
things connected with religious worship which merely 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 457 

gratified the animal senses, and said authoritatively, 
'' God that made the world and all things therein, seeing 
that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in 
temples made with hands; neither is worshiped with 
men^s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing 
he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things" (Acts 
xvii. 24, 25). 

It invited men away from all that is gorgeous and 
imposing and gratifying to the flesh, to a pure and un- 
defiled religion. It substituted in the place of Jewish 
tradition and rabbinical learning and heathen philosophy 
and mystic oracles, faith in an unseen but ever-living 
and ever-present Saviour, and implicit obedience to him 
in all the affairs of life; walking not by sight, but by 
faith, and trusting not in the wisdom or power of man, 
but in the living God. The result w^as, that while proud 
and wicked men raged and scoffed, and sought by fire 
and sword and every cruelty they could invent and in- 
flict to put down the new religion, it took its abode not 
in temples and palaces, but in the hearts of men, and 
the name of Jesus w^as the theme of millions of human 
hearts. Heathen temples were deserted, heathen altars 
w^ere without victims, heathen priests were without fol- 
lowers, and the blessed Redeemer had conquered the 
world without sword or purse or earthly power by the 
irresistible power of love. 

But many had joined themselves to the Christian army 
who did not appreciate the divine beauty of its sim- 
plicity, and who were not willing to learn to walk by 
faith and not by sight. These could discover that in 
every turn in the Christian system there were mysteries 
as profound as the mind of God; and, desiring to walk 
by sight rather than by faith, they plunged into these, 
and failing, as all men must, to fathom the secrets of 
39 



458 



JOEN PACKER MITCHELL. 



eternity, they brought forth from the profound depths 
new systems of mystery which out-did the mysteries of 
heathenism which were being overthrown. The great 
mistake made by these men was^ that Jesus was a teacher 
like the great Greek founders of systems of philosophy^ 
only that he was more profound and more correct; and, 
as it was customary to teach men the subtile metaphysics 
of the Greek schools, for the purpose of imparting to 
their minds all that was in the minds of the founders, 
respectively, of each particular founder of a system, so 
an effort was made to make the disciples of Jesus sound 
in phik)sophy rather than in faith. It must be kept in 
mind that none of the heathen systems were founded in 
faith. 

The followers of Zeno did not believe what he said 
because he said it, nor because of any reverence they 
had for him, but because they believed the reasoning by 
which his conclusions were reached. It was assumed 
that other men were capable of comprehending and in- 
vestigating all that had been comprehended and investi- 
gated by Zeno; and hence, those who became Stoics, or 
disciples of Zeno, were led by reason and not by faith at 
all. Efforts were made even in the lifetime of John, to 
reduce Christianity to a system of philosophy, more cor- 
rect and more profound than any other system, but still 
a set of conclusions to be reasoned out. instead of com- 
mands to be implicitly obeyed, and threats and promises 
to be implicitly believed, because stamped by the author- 
ity of Almighty God. 

Disputes and controversies were thus engendered in 
the church, which much annoyed the more humble dis- 
ciples, and perplexed and troubled thousands with ques- 
tions which never ought to have been raised at all. The 
triumph of ^Hhe faith once delivered to the saints'' was, 



SER3rONS AND ADDRESSES. 459 

in spite of all this, then as now, the divine beauty of 
Christ which captivated men's hearts, even when some of 
his professed followers did all they could to obscure that 
beauty, and sought to make his heavenly wisdom and 
glory a mere system of philosophy and a mere human 
glory. 

In the year 313, that truly great man, Constantine, 
who w^as then making his way through seas of gore, and 
over mountains of slaughtered men to the throne of the 
Eoman Empire, professed to be converted to Christian- 
ity. The story of his conversion is well known to many 
of you. He was marching to attack his rival, Maxen- 
tins, in the city of Rome, when, according to his own 
story, he saw a fiery cross emblazoned on the sky with 
the inscription, " hao vice/' — in this conquer. Immedi- 
ately he threw all the weight of his authority and power 
into an effort to Christianize the w^orld, and whole tribes 
and nations sometimes professed to be converted at once. 
Probably they were as truly converted as the emperor 
himself, for he continued to be a man of blood, and 
while he did many things favorable to the church, he 
enjoyed all the immense advantages which the support of 
the vast empire, now numbering millions, could bring him. 

The disputes and difficulties which had so long an- 
noyed the church and weakened its power still continued, 
and two conflicting systems of philosophy in regard to 
the Godhead were agitating the whole religious world. 
One Arius, a man of much learning and ability, had 
drawn many with him into a speculation in regard to the 
nature of Christ, while men of equal learning and equal 
zeal were advocating an opposing speculation. The Em- 
peror Constantine hoped that a general council, com- 
posed of bishops from all parts of the Christianized 
world, could settle the difficulty and decide once for all 



460 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



what was tlie truth in regard to the whole question. 
Accordingly, by his authority, such a council was called 
at Nice, in Bithynia, and, after much contention, the 
weight of Constantine's sword decided the case against 
Arius; and the doctrine of the Trinity, as it is called, 
was set forth in the Mcene creed, from which it has 
been copied into ail the orthodox creeds of modern 
times. 

But the decision of a council could not change the 
opinions of the fierce sectaries, who were unwilling to 
admit the authority of a council to settle such a question 
for them. There sprang up four or five different schools 
of Arians, and the Nicerians could not agree among 
themselves in regard to the words in which their doc- 
trines were set forth. At first a decree of banishment 
was passed and carried into effect against Arius, and he 
was driven to Illyria, but an Arian priest persuaded the 
emperor to recall him and he was brought back to the 
court of Constantine. For years the contest was thus 
carried on, sometimes one side gaining the supremacy, 
and sometimes the other, as the mind of the ruling sov- 
ereign could be gained by the advocates of either. The 
results of this great struggle, one would think, ought 
to have prevented forever all attempts to state philoso- 
phically the great mysteries which God has left unex- 
plained; but alas! to this day, the very same cause is 
at work to distress and divide the loving hearts of 
Christ's people, and to obscure the teachings of the word 
of God, 

But there were also many men who united themselves 
with the church who brought with them their pride, and 
who lusted after the gorgeous and imposing things of 
Paganism and Judaism. N'o sooner had the newly con- 
verted emperor dismantled the ancient heathen temples 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES 461 

and prevented their costly exhibitions, than the houses 
erected for the worship of Christians began to put on 
the gold and glitter of heathen temples, and the simple, 
beautiful worship instituted by the apostles, began to 
give way to ceremonies and mystic rites which rivaled 
those which had been destroyed with heathenism. Thus 
the expensive and glittering ceremonies of the Roman 
Catholic Church began. 

So one after another innovation crept into the church, 
and it ceased entirely to be what it was when the Lord 
added daily the saved. But still, amid all these trap- 
pings, and in spite of all this worldliness, the lovely 
character of Jesus could not be w^holly obscured, but 
shone forth and reached men's hearts, and with wonder 
and awe we must learn that the religion of Jesus can 
not die. Now while men are sad and weary under sin, 
and while hearts are breaking at the graves of their 
dead, and while the shadows of sin and death brood 
over the earth, the song first sung by angel voices Avill 
continue to captivate the hearts of the living and soothe 
the sorrows of the dying. '^Behold w^e bring you glad 
tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people, for 
unto us is born this day in the city of David, a Saviour 
who is Christ the Lord.'' 

While emperors, and bishops, and patriarchs were con- 
structing theories, and fulminating decrees and sentences 
against one another, in millions of quiet hearts there was 
peace that passeth knowledge, while humble worshipers 
looked up to God in simple faith through Christ our 
Lord. But a sad and gloomy night settled down upon 
the Christian world when the Bible was locked up in 
monasteries and cloisters, and the only knowledge which 
a sinful, dying world could obtain of Jesus and his sal- 
vation was through the perverted systems of a supersti- 



462 



JOHN BACKER MITCHELL, 



tious priesthood. A thousand years of darkness dragged 
slowly away, during which all those who struggled to re- 
store the ^vord of God to men and overturn the super- 
stitions which prevailed were put to death, with scarce a 
chance to send their names and deeds to after ages, 
w^hich should enjoy what they had labored and died for 
in vain. But when popes, and priests, and kings had 
done their worst, and when the darkness seemed the 
deepest, the Lord raised up an array of holy men, with 
a faith in Jesus which defied death and with a sublime 
courage which could face " the frowns, and scoffs, and 
threats of a w^hole frowning, scoffing and threatening 
world. Too much praise can scarcely be bestowed upon 
that great and good man, Martin Luther. I wish that 
every body was acquainted with his history, and more 
than all do I wish that every one was as willing as he 
to accept the light that comes to them. 

I think that one of the grandest scenes in all history, 
is that in which Luther stands alone before two hun- 
dred of the greatest men of earth, in the city of Worms, 
and refused to recant one w^ord of the writings he had 
directed against the corruptions of Rome, and in favor 
of a pure Apostolic Christianity. All Germany was in 
a blaze under the efforts of this great reformer and his 
co-workers, and the foundation was laid for that great 
power called Protestantism. But it is not my purpose 
to follow the history of the great Lutheran reformation, 
nor would time permit me to do so now, if I were so 
inclined. I desire merely to call attention to the first 
great light that sprang up after the long night of igno- 
rance and superstition, when the Bible was again given 
to the world, and men could study for themselves the 
simple beauty of the apostolic gospel. And I wish to 
say that none can go beyond me in the profound respect 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 463 

and veneration I have for those men who struck those 
first and telling blows against the corruptions of Rome ; 
but I conceive that I can honor them by following the 
light as tliej did, and instead of following their wisdom 
as my guide, turn to the wisdom of inspired men in the 
word of God, which they unchained. 

But it must have seemed strange to you that Protest- 
antism should have divided and subdivided into so many 
sects and parties, when tliey all profess, as a fundamental 
principle, to take the Holy Scriptures as the only infalli- 
ble rule of faith and practice; and this very fact has, 
unquestionably, driven many men of good minds into 
unbelief and disbelief in regard to the divine origin of 
Christianity, and they have been driven away from it 
altogether. 

All this difficulty arises from the same mistake that 
was made in the early church, that Christianity could be 
reduced to a system of philosophy, and remain a system 
of faith. Every difference of opinion in regard to the 
unrevealed mysteries of the gospel, thus gave rise to 
new statements in the form of creeds; and as surely as 
men's minds differ by nature and by education, their 
opinions must differ in regard to questions so profound. 
A great many persons have not been able to appreciate 
the reason why we repudiate the idea of being a sect, 
and why we refuse to accept the position of a denomina- 
tion among denominations. I think there are actually a 
great many identified with us who do not fully under- 
stand the great purpose of our movement. What was 
undertaken by the disciples in the first quarter of the 
present century, was not a reformation of any existing 
institutions. Thomas and Alexander Campbell were both 
Presbyterians of the secession school. The effort was not 
to reform Presbyterian ism in any of its branches; for. 



464 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

if such an effort had been successfully made, the result 
would have been only a reformed Presbyterian church. 
No, the thing undertaken was to reduce to practice what 
all the Protestant churches held already in theory — to 
make the Holy Scriptures the only rule of faith and 
practice, discarding ail attempts to make Christianity, 
in any sense, a philosophical system. I do not think 
the great and good men who inaugurated this move- 
ment had any idea where it would lead to. I know 
that both Alexander Campbell and his father had been 
sprinkled in infancy, and both expected to advocate 
sprinkling for baptism to the day of their death ; but 
when they found to follow the Scriptures alone would 
require them to be buried with Christ in baptism, they 
hesitated not on account of old and endearing associa- 
tions, but arose at once and were immersed. At first 
every body said the new movement must prove a fail- 
ure; that many necessary things for church government, 
etc., were unprovided for in the Bible ; and that such 
an organization as that contemplated could not exist; 
but after half a century of trial, we ask the world to 
look upon our present condition, and tell us whether 
there has been, from the day that corruption first 
entered the church, until this day, a people more firmly 
bound together, or more firm in the faith of the gospel. 
It was hardly recognized at first that the only object of 
faith set forth in the Scriptures is our Lord Jesus Christ; 
and when this was recognized, the beautiful and glorious 
results of such faith were scarcely understood. But now, 
in conclusion, let us briefly sketch the gospel in its sub- 
lime simplicity, and see how many doubts and difficulties 
are removed in a moment when we take the simple, un- 
sophisticated word of God to guide us. Christ is the 
great foundation upon which the whole revelation of God 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 4G5 

turns. With Christ- taken away, the Bible would be a 
mystery and a mockery. There is one thing, and one 
alone, established in the Scriptures by infallible proof, 
that is, that Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God. If 
one believes this, it follows, of course, that he is admit- 
ted to be one who is capable of guiding and controlling 
all our actions with the wisdom and correctness of God; 
and that, if he desires so to control them, his authority 
ought to be submitted to by all mortals. 

To know Christ, we should study the four evangel- 
ists; to know^ how to enter his school, we should study the 
Acts of Apostles ; to know how to practically conform 
our lives to his will, in all their details, we should study 
the epistles. Suppose one studies the life, and with a 
heart overflowing with love for Jesus, asks : " What will 
he have me to do?" shall we raise questions with him 
about the philosophy of the Holy Spirit^s operation? 
shall w^e distract his mind with all the metaphysics of 
the schools on the subject of regeneration? No; we are 
free from all that speculation. He is a man of faith ; 
ours is a religion of faith. He is ready to take that 
man Christ Jesus by the hand and be led whithsoever 
he will. He will walk by faith. In God's name, point 
out to him how Jesus would have him walk, and let him 
go forth. Does he believe in the Holy Spirit ? Yes, he 
believes every w^ord that is stamped by the authority of 
Jesus. Does he know how the Spirit operates? I shall 
never ask him. He is not coming into a school of phi- 
losophy; but into a school of faith. Will he finally per- 
severe, and get to heaven ? Yes ; if he add to his faith 
virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge temperance, 
etc., he shall never fall. 



466 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



OUR HOPE IN DEATH. 

Sermon preached in Forest, III, Oct. 3, 1869. 

'' I am the resurrection, and the life : he that believeth in me, though he 
were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me 
shall never die." — John xi. 25, 26. 

No Christian can look upon men and women of the 
world who devote every effort and apparently every 
thought of their lives to a gratification of their animal 
desires, without a feeling of wonder as well as of pity. 
We can not but wonder that with every thing around 
them, warning them in the most striking manner of the 
transitory nature of all things earthly, they should ap- 
parently devote all their thoughts to the poor, frail, 
short-lived body in which they live. How incomprehen- 
sible it is that so many millions of human beings neither 
profess nor care to profess any certainty of an existence 
beyond this world of sorrow, trial and weariness. If 
the whole world were a garden of delights, whose un- 
mixed pleasure flowed perpetually, and we had nothing 
to do but enjoy it, even then one thinks the good sense 
of mankind ought to lead them to desire and seek for a 
state of being which would not so soon cease. But 
when we remember the toil, the anxiety, the care and 
the weariness which surrounds the lives even of earth^s 
most favored ones, it is truly wonderful that all do not 
seek for a place of rest, for a home of quiet and peace, 
where the soul may find that repose it longs for, but 



SEBMONS AND ADDRESSES. 4G7 

which the earth never furnishes. If the living eye never 
gazed upon the cold and staring eye of death ; if the 
warm human hand never rested upon the frozen hand of 
the dead ; if no idea of death ever forced itself upon the 
mind at all, we would think that human beings, by the 
mere exaltation of their own nature, would rise above 
the paltry, weak and giddy desires which seem to influ- 
ence so great a number of our race. But when we reflect 
that all nature, all art, all knowledge — that "life is dying 
and death is living,'^ how much greater the puzzle is 
that those capable of immortality hug mortality to their 
bosoms, and devote what little life they have to the 
gratification and adornment of the poor feeble body, 
which must soon sink into the cold, stern arms of death. 
There is nothing else so unaccountable presented for the 
study of mortal man. It is not those only who profess 
to believe that there is nothing beyond the life we now 
live; it is not only those deluded souls who have fallen 
upon the shoals of unbelief, but thousands and tens of 
thousands who assent to the truths of the Christian re- 
ligion, and who believe that there is something beyond 
the grave worth having, and which they propose to secure 
some time for themselves before death. Some persons, 
when looking at this dreadful condition of things, will 
heave a sigh, and say, alas, poor humanity! But we at- 
tribute it to more than humanity. Look at the human 
race from other stand-points, and you see nothing any 
way similar to this. We see the human family, the world 
over, lay up stores for winter before winter comes upon 
them. AVe see the young endeavor to prepare for the 
weakness and decrepitude of age while in the vigor of 
youth; and so, wherever the race of man is found, their 
vision is strained to the future, in attempts to foresee and 
prepare for its contingencies. The inhabitants of low, flat 



468 JOBN PACKER MITCHELL. 

countries along tlie coasts of seas, build vast dykes of 
prodigious strength to beat back an ocean which slumbers 
at their feet like a sleeping child. But they know it will 
not always sleep. They hear, in imagination, the howl- 
ing of coming storms which shall drive the foaming bil- 
lows high upon the works of their hands, and they toil 
unceasingly against a danger indefinitely in the future. 
And thus it goes the world over — man every-where shoAvs 
himself possessed of attributes worthy of himself in all 
except that which concerns his weal or woe for eternity. In 
all that has for its object the bettering of his earthly 
condition, he will perform works that will astonish him- 
self; but when the dread issue is between eternal life and 
eternal death, it seems not to call forth an effort. 

Now, why is this ? Where shall we seek a solution to 
this strange puzzle ? It is not because there are not suf- 
ficient warnings of the approching evil. The wrecks of 
all that is mortal, stretching back through six thousand 
years of human history and human misery ; the sighs, the 
groans, the tears, the graves of earth, speak with a voice 
which none can fail to hear and none can fail to under- 
stand. The kings of earth, seated upon thrones of gold, 
surrounded by all the splendors of the world, owe their 
own elevation to the death of their predecessors. Eng- 
land's queen looks out upon the graves in which a thou- 
sand years have laid the bones of her ancestors. The 
butterflies of fashion who throng her courts, see all 
around them the evidence that twenty generations have 
preceded them, and gone down to the bed of death. 
Where are the great, the wise, the weak, the foolish, the 
millions on millions wdio, during sixty centuries have had 
their day ! Gone ! all gone ! All swept into a common 
grave, until the whole earth is one vast graveyard. 
Death is every-where. The beautiful flo^vers that scent 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES 469 

the breeze of summer are but breathing out their own 
lives, and bringing to our senses the evidence of death. 
The fruits of autumn, severed from the stalks on which 
they grow, and passing rapidly to decay, tell us of death. 
The cold and gloomy winter spreads a winding-sheet over 
the dead seasons which are gone, and repeats to us the 
warning of death. We turn to our homes, and the shadoAV 
is there. Who has not lost a friend? Who has not 
followed them to the brink of the chill river, and seen 
them launch out upon the dark waters Avith no human 
companion ? Who has not gazed upon the forms of those 
who composed our loved and loving home circles, and 
fdt the heart grow sick with the thought that the shadow 
of death was upon us all? It is death at home, and death 
abroad, and death on every hand. The earth cursed for 
man's sake, brings forth only death; and, turn where we 
will, we see coffins and the grave. Then the indifierence 
of the world is not owing to a lack of admonition on the 
subject, for all their senses are met by admonition at 
every turn. That the warning is not heeded, can not be 
attributed to the weakness of humanity alone, for w^hen 
left to itself, human nature universally provides for the 
future with more care than for the present. Then, where 
shall we find a solution to the strange puzzle? We an- 
swer, in the Word of God: "The serpent was more 
subtle than any beast of the field w^hich the Lord God had 
made." The same old crafty foe who whispered to 
mother Eve : " Thou shalt not surely die," deceives her 
children now, that they may not realize their danger and 
prepare for death. We say this, not upon human au- 
thority, but by the authority of the Holy Spirit ; as it is 
written in Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians: "And you 
hach he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; 
wherein in time past ye walked according to the course 



470 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 



of this world, according to the prince of the power of 
the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of 
disobedience^^ (Eph. ii. 1,2). And again in 2 Cor. iv. : 
" But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost : 
in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds 
of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious 
gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine 
unto them.'' Thus we have it explained why human na- 
ture presents so strange an aspect, ever preparing for the 
wants which are merely temporal, and wholly neglecting 
that which is eternal. They prefer darkness rather than 
light, and they get what they prefer. The fabled Siren 
of the ancients, who sat among dead men's skulls and 
lured storm-tossed mariners upon sunken rocks and to 
speedy destruction by strains of the sweetest music, was 
not all a myth. ^^The prince of the power of the air," 
the dread enemy of human kind, follows our race like 
our own shadows, and the lost spirits of his empire find 
congenial employment in seeking the ruin of souls. The 
Siren voices which sing of pleasure and animal gratifica- 
tion allure the storm-tossed voyagers on life's sea to a de- 
struction far more terrible than any dream of the ancient 
mythology. The mind is lulled into a false security, the 
heart is kept ever excited by hopes never realized, and 
as the apostle strongly expresses it, "Their foolish heart 
is darkened ; " so that they madly serve their own lusts 
all their lives, and go down to dark, hopeless graves, and 
eternal death. 

We often hear it said, by those not in the faith, that 
wicked men frequently die without a terror ; while Chris- 
tians sometimes betray great horror in the grasp of the 
grim monster. All this may be true. We have no 
doubt that the power of Satan over the mind, submissive 
to his will, is able to deaden the moral sensibilities so 



SER3I0NS AND ADDRESSES. 

that a man may die like an ox ; and Ave have no idea that 
the Christian religion proposes to take away the natural 
shrinking of the flesh from death. I have been by the 
bed-side of the Christian until the journey of life had led 
to the chill river's brink, and until the soul took its 
flight. The desire to live was strong, and the shrinking 
from death perceptible. But when all hope of longer 
life in the flesh was gone; how that " hope, strong and 
steadfast, which entereth to that within the vail,'' light- 
ened up the dying countenance, and filled the whole be- 
ing of the departing pilgrim ! The Christian's hope, like 
the* Christian's life, is not a mere negative thing; but is 
positive, enabling us to triumph even in the last dread 
extremity, and amid the pangs of dissolving nature. 
Death, like the other ills to which mortality is subject, is 
a thing of gloomy aspect to the saint as well as to the 
sinner. The flesh of the Christian in no way differs from 
the flesh of men of the world ; and the thought that the 
bounding heart must cease to throb, that the warm tide 
of life must curdle in the veins, that the cold dew of 
death must gather on the brow, that the whole body must 
be laid in the gloomy grave and mingle with the dust, is 
a disagreeable one to all human beings in their right 
minds. Much evil has been done by a school of moral- 
ists who Avould have the world believe that all true fol- 
lowers of Christ can look death in the face without a 
shudder. The world knows it is not true; or else there 
are no such followers. Christians love life, and shun 
death, and they struggle just as desperately for long life 
as any others of Adam's race. What a pity it is that so 
many of the friends of Christianity seek to base the 
Christian's hope upon some other than the true founda- 
tion, and thus place stumbling-blocks in the way of the 
very persons they seek to win. Now to offer to men, as 



472 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 

an inducement to come to Christ, that Christianity will 
take away all the natural dread of death, is but to rear a 
new temple for the false gods of infidelity. Human ex- 
perience teaches otherwise, and the eye of the world 
looks incredulously upon those who teach what they can 
not practice. The truth is, the religion of Jesus Christ 
does not propose to relieve us from any of life's ills, ex- 
cept such as result from our own passions and lusts. "We 
suffer afiQictions all along life's journey, and often a 
greater number of them than the wicked. The bearing 
of these trials patiently is part of our life-work; and 
when we can say with Paul, I glory in tribulations also, 
we have attaiued an exalted position; but the fact that 
we bear these afilictions with patience and resignation, 
looking to the glorious reward beyond, is no proof that 
they are not heavy to bear. The fact that with us 
"tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, 
and experience hope,'' does not make the suffering of 
these life-trials any the less wearisome to the human 
body which suffers. The difference between the suffer- 
ings of the good and those of the bad in this life is not 
to be measured by physical standards; for flesh is flesh, 
w^hether of good men or bad. 

The righteous and the wicked are like two ships far 
out upon a vast and tempest-beaten ocean. The light- 
nings, the winds, and the dashing billows beat upon 
both alike. The hurricanes and the calms, the rocks 
and the waves, are as much dreaded by the one as the 
other. But with the one, the man at the lookout strains 
his eye in vain for star, or sun, or peaceful harbor. It is 
storm, and tempest, and fear all around, and blackness 
of darkness beyond. With the other there is a smiling 
heaven of rest ever in sight. The glorious guiding star 
of our faith never grows dim. When the cry goes up 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 473 

from white and quivering lips to the lookout aloft, 
"What cheer?'' the answer conies back, clear as the 
note of the clarion, above howling storm and dash of 
waves, "The star, the star, the star of Bethlehem ! '' We 
see the peaceful rest, the delightful calm, the unending 
bliss in which all our afflictions terminate, and triumph in 
the midst of anguish in the reflection that these " light 
afflictions, which are but for a moment, work out for us 
a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory/' Death 
is an eclipse to both good and bad. But to the good it 
is one of those beautiful eclipses which shows a ring of 
intense brilliancy all around the sun which is in shadow. 
To the bad, it is a total eclipse, blacker and wilder than 
night, and all ghostly things which dwell in darkness are 
abroad. " Faith," says the poet, " is a ring around the 
eclipse we call death." 

But let it no longer be represented to the w^orld that 
the followers of Chri.st have no horror of death. It is 
one of the evils of our present state, not produced by our 
passions, and like all others which are inevitable, we 
bear it with meekness and resignation ; but the grave 
seems cold, and death terrible, nevertheless. The indig- 
nities heaped upon our blessed Lord, the scourging, the 
crow^n of thorns, the carrying of .his own cross, the 
horrors of the crucifixion, were none the less painful to 
him as a son of Adam, than to the bad ruffians who died 
with him. "He offered up prayers and supplications 
with strong crying and tears, unto him that was able to 
save him from death ; " and so all who follow him will 
shrink from death, though they do not dread the issue 
beyond. 

Christianity does not propose to free us from the afflic- 
tions of life in the flesh, but to give us a neio life w^hich 
lives above all the ills that flesh is heir to, and never 
40 



474 



JOHN PACKER MITCHELL, 



dies. The hope we have is much more exalted than any 
thing which would merely free us from that natural dread 
of animal death. Our religion has a higher aim than the 
mere liberation of the physical body from the pains it 
must suffer^ because it is physical. To free us from the 
innate dread of death our earthly nature inflicts upon us, 
would be something altogether unworthy the great sac- 
rifice it cost heaven. The simple destruction of our intel- 
lect would remove all horror of the grave, and we might 
die as the summer's flowers. But, thank God, fallen and 
undone as we are, we were accounted worthy of eternal 
life, if we would accept the gift offered us, and may begin 
a life on earth which neither death nor hell can destroy. 
Christianity takes a son of Adam and makes him a son 
of God. It does not make the old life eternal; but it 
gives us a new life, which death has no more to do with 
than it has with heaven itself. ^^ If any man be in Christ, 
he is a new creature : old things are passed away ; behold, 
all things are become new;" (2 Cor. v. 17). This is the 
idea we have been seeking to develop. Too many of 
the followers of Christ seem to think that the immortal 
life of the redeemed family of the second Adam, is a 
lengthening out of the term which the first Adam forfeited, 
and this is the source of the difficulty they get into in 
regard to the death of the body. They never can under- 
stand the oft-repeated declarations of the Saviour, that 
his followers shall never die. But a careful study of the 
New Testament reveals fully what the meaning of these 
declarations are. It is the new life which never dies, 
and to which the death of the body gives perfect freedom. 
Hence the reason that the Christian can triumph in death, 
and rejoice notwithstanding the pangs of the expiring 
body. When Stephen was stoned, the blows fell as 
heavily and smote as painfully upon his body, as they 



SER3IQNS AND ADDRESSES. 475 

would have done on the bodies of his murderers. His 
triumph was not in that he had no consciousness of pain, 
but that despite the pangs of death he could enter upon 
the full development of life in Christ, and forget the 
afflictions of earth in the glorious vision which burst 
upon his dying eye : " The heavens opened, and he 
saw the Son standing on the right hand of God.'' 

Death to the Christian is like the pain which a blind 
person endures in having a surgical operation performed 
upon the sensitive and delicate organs of sight. He feels 
the pain intensely, and would shun it if he could: but 
bears it with calm resignation in hope of again receiving 
light where all was darkness. " The valley of the 
shadow" is gloomy and dark, and its chill strikes to the 
heart; but the Christian bears it without a murmur, 
because his eye is fixed upon the glorious light beyond. 
The pains of his animal nature terminates in the full 
development of his life in Christ. 

Now let us turn to the beautiful and sublime words of 
Christ, which we have read. When it was told him that 
Lazarus was sick, he said: "This sickness is not unto 
death;" yet Lazarus actually died and laid in the grave 
four days. Did the Saviour say what he did not mean? 
Or did he predict what he knew to be untrue ? We know 
he did not. We know that if there is any thing in his 
words we can not comprehend, it is because of our weak- 
ness and ignorance, and not because of any deception on 
the part of him who could not deceive. But is there any 
thing in these words which we are incapable of under- 
standing? If he had merely said, "the sickness is not 
unto death," and Lazarus had afterward died, and nothing 
further was done, then there would be a mystery in it 
which we might seek in vain to unravel. But the subse- 
quent words and actions of the Saviour make it all as 



476 JOHN PACKER MITCHELL. 

plain as noon-day, and furnish a glorious consolation to 
all of his disciples. Turning, then, to the language we 
have read, we find a declaration which thrills the soul of 
every believer with Divine life and peace : " I am the 
resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me though 
he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and 
believeth in me shall 7iever die.'^ All life is from God, 
whether vegetable, animal, intellectual or spiritual. In 
John V. 26, we find Jesus gave the key to his meaning in 
declaring that the sickness of Lazarus was not unto death. 
Says he: ^^ For as the Father hath life in himself, so 
hath he given to the Son to have life in himself" This 
was his meaning then. No man can be said to be dead to 
whom Christ has given life. As he had power of life in 
himself, which he proposed to exercise for the resurrection 
of Lazarus, he might say with all propriety and truth " it 
is not unto death." But the life which he at this time 
gave Lazarus was not eternal life, but was simply the 
resurrection of the body, in demonstration of his power to 
give life to whomsoever he would. The time had not yet 
arrived for the conferring of everlasting life upon the 
sons of men in the flesh, and the full meaning of the 
words, " Whosoever liveth and believeth on me shall never 
die," can only be understood in the full light which was 
revealed from heaven after Christ's ascension. To make 
the meaning of his words yet plainer, and to show that the 
life and death to which he referred were not those of the 
body, we refer you to John vi. 63, where he says, "It is 
the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing." 
Many persons imagine that this language of Christ has 
reference to the raising up at the last day merely, and 
that he meant that the death of the believer's body was 
not death, because he would raise it up. But he says, 
John v. 28, 29 : " The hour is coming, in the which all 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES. 477 

that are in their graves shall hear his voice, and shall come 
forth : they that have done good, unto the resurrection of 
life ; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection 
of damnation.^' Here, then, we certainly have the truth 
stated, so that none can fuil to apprehend it. The Son of 
Ood says : " Whosoever liveth and believeth on me, shall 
never die/' The question before us is, Does this refer to 
the body ? If this question had been proposed to Christ 
himself, and he had answered positively no ! it would not 
have been more emphatic than the answer we have. All 
that are in their graves shall come forth, they that believe 
US ivell as they who do not; but one comes forth to the 
resurrection of life; the other to the resurrection of 
damnation, or eternal life. Then the bringing forth 
from the grave is not the life promised to believers, 
nor is the death of the body the only death the wicked 
must suffer, and it is truth as well as poetry. 

" Beyond this vale of tears 
There is a life above, 
Unmeasured by the flight of years; 
And all that life is love. 
There is a death whose pang 
Outlasts the fleeting breath ; 
Oh, what eternal horrors hang 
Around that second death ! " 

How shall we discover in what manner the promise of 
our Lord was fulfilled? For that it was and is fulfilled 
to the letter, none of us can doubt. We are satisfied 
that the death of the body was not what he had refer- 
ence to; and we know that "in Adam all die.'' What, 
then, did he mean? Let us turn to the words of one 
who did believe on Christ, and thus fulfilled the con- 
ditions upon which eternal life was promised, and see 
how he viewed it when writing by inspiration of God. 
Let us see if he thought everlasting meant a suspension 



478 



JOHN PACKER mTCHELL. 



and a reanimation. Listen to the grand words of the 
Apostle Paul : " I am crucified with Christ : nevertheless 
I live; yet nut I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life 
which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the 
Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me " 
(Gal. ii. 20). The resurrection of the body to glory and 
immortality is not the life, but the consequence of it; for 
hear the apostle again : " But if the Spirit of him that 
raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that 
raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your 
mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you'' (Rom. 
viii. 11). We have, then, the solution of the whole 
question. It is a new life which is formed in us by the 
word of God — by the word of truth. " The words 
which I speak unto you, they ai'e Spirit, and they are 
life,'' says the Saviour; and, when the life thus formed 
is brought forth in the new birth, we are "^ new crea- 
ture." Christ lives in us by faith, and the life thus 
formed is eternal. 

Let us always clearly distinguish what the hope of 
the Christian is. Let it not be said to the world, that 
we do not care for the pain and gloom of the hour w^hen 
the body dies ; but let it be known lo all mankind that 
we glory, not in any stoical philosophy wMch makes us 
insensible to life's ills or death's pangs, but in a divine 
life, which we live ^^ by faith in the Son of God," and 
which lives whether the body is in life or in death. 
We seek no triumph of earth We have no desire to 
have it thought that we can suffer physical death like a 
brute; but we want it to be know^n to the ends of the 
earth that we enjoy a spiritual life which is everlasting. 

But shall we devote some time to a view of our fellow- 
beings who with us are doomed to temporal death, but, 
unlike us, have no hope of immortality ! How fearful a 



SEB3I0NS AND ADDRESSES, 479 

prospect is before them ! No life for the body, and no 
life for the soul ; Avith death gazing them always in the 
face here, and eternal death beyond ! If physical death 
is terrible ; if the flesh shrinks from the pang which it 
is to endure for a moment, how fearful is that death 
which lasts throughout all eternity! If the separation 
of the body from natural life is looked upon with hor- 
ror, how horrible is the thought of the eternal separa- 
tion from the source of all life ! Then, when we behold 
the indifference of the men and women of the world to 
the approaching physical death, which all must die, how 
much more terrible is the view when we know that they 
not only have death all around them, and ever in their 
sight, but within them they have a dead spirit, which, 
without the quickening power of God's word, must en- 
dure indescribable torture throughout unending ages. 
Oh ! this is death, indeed ; and fully consummates the 
dreadful purpose Satan proposed to accomplish when 
he first secured dominion over our race, and which he 
continually labors to advance. In our warfare against 
such a foe, let us never rest nor lay our armor down ; 
let us never grow weary, but sound out on every hand 
the word of God, which can give life to the dead souls 
of a dying world. 

May God help us in this work, and strengthen us for 
every duty, is my constant prayer, for Christ's sake. 
Amen. 



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